


What You Sow

by runrarebit



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: AU, Alpha Kylo Ren, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, F/F, F/M, Film canon mainly, Han trying to be a decent father and not always succeeding, Homophobia within an a/b/o world, However you'd term misogyny when it's directed towards omegas but also misogyny misogyny, I swear this was meant to be smuttier, Kylo Ren Being a Little Shit, Kylo Ren Has Issues, Kylo Ren's questionable sexual fantasies, M/M, Masturbation, Misogyny, Murder, Non-Traditional Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Not a redemption fic, Omega Armitage Hux, Pornography, Rape/Non-con Elements, Regret, Self-Fisting, Sexism, Slow Burn, Slut Shaming, Smut, So no one's turning to the Light Side just FYI, Some background stuff with Leia/Han/Luke that may not amount to much we shall see, Tags May Change, Unreliable Narrator, Violence, Well this is getting structually inconsistent, a touch of incest, also I forgot to tag for, attack of the plot, beta rey, but a self improvement fic, instincts, just a reminder that this is not a redemption fic, misogynist language, omegas are both fierce and bloodthirsty, reality is complicated, there will be smut, toxic masculinity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-19
Updated: 2019-04-27
Packaged: 2019-10-12 17:14:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 31
Words: 85,480
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17471651
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/runrarebit/pseuds/runrarebit
Summary: Snoke was the First Order's Dominant Alpha, in killing him Kylo has both taken his place and destabilized the social structure, throwing the First Order's omegas into heat and alphas into rut at a time when the fleet's pheromone scrubbers have ceased working. Kylo, an alpha who does not like omegas, finds this deeply troublesome, all the more so when Hux goes into heat.PLEASE READ CHAPTER NOTE.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> It's funny to think that "Non-traditional Alpha/Beta/Omega dynamics" is a tag when I've been around since the genesis of the genre and long before there were any such traditions to be subverted. So many times over the years I've read A/B/O fics and thought to myself "This isn't what I wanted"- so here we are, something a little closer to what I imagined back then when I first ever read an A/B/O fic. Thank you Supernatural fandom, and the kink meme, for what you have wrought.
> 
> I'm not sure I'll get this fic finished, or how much of it I'll write, but I aim for at least one more chapter. If any of you were around for my last fic I don't think I have the time or the energy to write as prolifically as I did then right now, and it's been a while so I feel pretty rusty, nonetheless I hope anyone who reads this enjoys it, and thank you for doing so and for any comments and kudos you might leave.

Things are never as simple as he wants them to be, there are always complications, always unwanted side-effects, and sometimes they’re unexpected, sometimes they’re the last thing he would have thought to prepare for. So it is that with the destruction of the _Supremacy_ came the destruction of the shipment of atmospheric pheromone scrubbers due to be replaced in every ship of the fleet. This should be fine because all remaining ships are well supplied with suppressants and birth control of the various types suitable for every set of sub-genders and medical status. So, there should be no problem. Except there is a problem, and he himself is the cause of it. 

He killed Snoke, something he is still quite proud of, but Snoke was the Dominant Alpha of what could be considered their pack, unmated admittedly, without a Dominant Omega (or Beta, or even Alpha—let’s not be old fashioned) mate, but still the Alpha, and in killing Snoke he has naturally taken the male’s place as Dominant Alpha, but in doing so he has also disturbed the pack hierarchy. Inevitably the remaining ships of the fleet will all fall to chaos, the combined pheromones of a disordered pack undoing all that modern medical science has mastered. Turns out not even top of the line suppressants are adequate to keep omegas from heat and alphas from rut when their natural instinct is to fuck their way to a stable social structure. His natural instinct. It is too easy to forget that he himself is an alpha. 

Again this would be no problem, or at least less of a problem, with working atmospheric pheromone scrubbers, but best estimates put it at a month before a new shipment will arrive, because of course the First Order ships had to be fitted with some top of the line but incredibly esoteric variety manufactured by a company that is currently embroiled in battling a buy-out attempt by one of its rivals— which has resulted in several suspicious warehouse fires that have taken out their stock of the scrubbers in question. So, two choices, either wait for new scrubbers to be manufactured, tested and dispatched, or patch in a different variety —which the techs estimate will take equally as long, considering it’s tricky business and requires specialist equipment they don’t have on hand. 

It’s Hux who tells him all of this, the man stiff, cold, stinking of the sharp and repulsive scent of an omega in distress. It’s a scent he woke up to. A scent that has infected the air aboard the Finalizer. His face curls up in disgust. For a moment he wishes he had not destroyed his helmet and the personal atmosphere scrubbers held within.

‘We’ll just have to find somewhere safe to keep the fleet and wait it out,’ is his answer when the redhead finally gets around to asking for his orders. ‘If you think you can manage.’ An omega. He should have guessed. The perfect answer to why Hux has always been so pathetic. 

A spike in that scent of distress, sharpening the edge until it almost makes his eyes water. He hates the way omegas smell, whether they’re upset—and they almost always seem to be upset— or in heat, it has always disgusted him. For a moment he’s a child, Luke standing over him, lightsabre in hand, the air around them reeking of rotting flowers and salt water.

‘I will be quite well, as long as you can control yourself,’ the redhead snaps, contempt edging into his voice.

It is easy, the flick of a wrist, a slap in the face with the Force, Hux crumples by his feet, the stink of distressed omega so strong he’s choking on it. Omega musk is always so distressingly floral. He forces his face to composure, does not snarl, does not wrap a noose of the Force around that long, pale neck and squeeze the life out of the omega in front of him. ‘That will not be a problem,’ he asserts and leaves the omega there, crumpled on the floor of the bridge for all to see.

Turns out it is, in fact, a problem. 

He wakes trying to knot his berth. Images flick through his half-conscious mind, Rey, beautiful, powerful, _beta_ , Rey. Her cunt. Tight, so tight, tight and sweet and clenching. Too small for him, built to be too small for him, so small he’d have to stretch her out first, tongue and fingers, maybe even a whole fist, before she could take his knot, but take it she would. Take it deep inside of her where it could change her, transform her, metamorphose her until her sweet, tight little cunt wasn’t so tight any more, until the very shape of its insides was stretched out to match the shape of his knot, until he’d _ruined_ her. Ruined her for all other men, _beta_ men, inferior men, until she was his and his alone. _Forever._

He’d tie to her, keep her tied to him, keep her in a nest he made just for her, and she’d love his nest, she’d praise his nest, she’d curl up in the softness of his nest and let him fuck her and fuck her and fuck her, fuck her until she was so loose he could pull his knot free without waiting for it to deflate, leave her wet and red and sticky and stretched out, his come oozing out of her, so much of it, so much it made her belly swell and her thighs sticky and the nest wet, slick, stinking of him, his musk, his pheromones, the fact that she was _his_. He’d get her fat with child, with pups, fuck her womb full of them so he could watch her push them out, watch them stretch out her cunt even more, then he’d get more of them on her, more and more, and each of them would be so powerful, a whole new generation of Force users birthed from him and her and— and—

He comes, snarling, teeth clenching into the soft fluff of his pillow as if it was the nape of her neck, as if he was holding her in place while he _mounted_ her. The berth has no hole for him to sink into, nothing for him to knot, and coming with nothing squeezing the bulb of flesh at the base of his cock is unpleasant. The orgasm is blunted, unsatisfying, shivering on the edge of dissipating until he gets a hand down there and wrapped tight and _squeezes_ , then. Then it coalesces, sharpens, the world tightening around him as he tightens his hand around his knot. ‘Fuck,’ he whines out against the damp cloth, the smell of his own spit strong in his nose. He shudders, convulses, humps desperately forward half smothering himself in the bedding. And comes and comes and comes until his hand cramps, until it feels like he’s pulled something down low in his pelvis, beneath his balls, until the bed is wet, soaked with his stinking, sticky come. And then it’s done. 

For a moment he just lies there, blankets and sleeping pants pushed down, ass and back feeling the chill of the air, goosebumps rising. Eventually he flops over onto his back, takes a deep breath and pulls in the stink of alpha before snorting, huffing, trying to get the faint and sweet, too sweet, smell of omega in heat out of his nose. Another snort, a hiss of disgust. One of them has gone off, gone into heat, pheromones overriding suppressants, which’ll set the rest of them off if he understands anything about omega biology, and when there’s omegas in heat alphas in rut are not far behind. 

A sigh and he scrubs a come-stinking hand over his face, then grimaces as he realises what he’s done. It’s probably Hux. Being the highest-ranking omega on the ship means his instincts will be screaming to cement that position before some young, pretty interloper takes it from him, and the best way an omega’s instincts know to cement their status is fucking the most powerful alpha they can compel. If the dumb cunt thinks he’ll be seduced into fucking the redhead’s status in the hierarchy permanently into _Dominant Omega_ the redhead has another long, hard think coming. 

Turns out it’s not Hux. 

The redhead is still perfectly calm and composed when he reports on the bridge, even with a faint shadowing of bruises coming out across the side of his face. For a moment he feels guilt. Even though he struck out at Hux he didn’t realise he’d hit the man so hard, but the guilt quickly fades. If he wants to hit Hux he should be allowed to hit Hux, simple as that; like every member of the First Order the redhead belongs to him. Not that there’s any reason to hit Hux. It’s not like discipline makes the man any more competent. Honestly some days he just contemplates throwing the omega out the nearest airlock. He wouldn’t even bother killing the redhead first. 

They discuss plans, he gives orders, and the entire time he can feel eyes on him. Alphas and omegas assessing him, alphas trying to determine if it’s worth challenging him, omegas if it’s worth trying to seduce him. It makes him feel like a piece of meat. When an alpha, some jumped up little Lieutenant, makes an almost subconscious move signalling aggression as he passes he’s glad at the chance to ignite his lightsabre and cut the presumptuous little shit in half. It almost makes him feel better. 

The whole thing gets worse when the first omega approaches him. 

He is on his way to the mess hall, craving the particularly disgusting salty, fatty, sinewy, spiced bovid stew served on this day of every week. All day he has been occupied, preoccupied, with images of hunting down large beasts, of ripping them apart with his bare hands, of burying his teeth in their flesh and feeling their hot, salty blood spurt into his mouth before dragging their carcass home to present to Rey, blood smeared and triumphant, so she can eat and he can fuck her full of another pup. His hands would be red with blood as he squeezed and groped at her flesh, leaving handprints across her perfect, pale skin, marks of his ownership.

The omega, a pretty woman, with dark brown hair and blue eyes, peels away from the group she’s walking with, also headed to the mess hall, and falls into step by his side. She reeks. She looks sweaty, dishevelled, as though she has been running her hands through her hair all day, uniform done up on the wrong buttons, the crotch of her trousers dark and wet with slick. Heat. The woman is in heat, full-blown heat, and just walking around the ship instead of hiding in her rooms as a proper omega should. 

She fidgets beside him, pulling the cloth of her shirt away from her neck before letting it go to flop back against her skin, a waft of heavy pheromones released into the air with the action. He stops walking, turns to look at her. ‘I bet you make a really good nest, Supreme Leader,’ she almost slurs out, irises a hair-fine line around the black well of her pupils, ‘Big man like you. A really good, big, hard, strong, fat, throbbing—’ her tongue peeks out, wets her bottom lip, ‘—nest. Do you want to show it to me?’

Her presence in the Force is strong, strange in the way heat makes it strange. It’s almost a haze around his impression of her, shimmering and shivering, popping and sparking with the pulse of her hormones, her urge to fuck, to fight, to use this moment to get a good mate, to get social advancement, to get fat with pups that will grow up to scale even higher on the social ladder. 

He doesn’t know what to do, what to say. This has never happened to him in the entirety of his life. Omegas don’t just— they don’t hit on people, they don’t walk around wet and reeking “fuck me, fuck me.” Omegas are shy and passive aggressive and pathetic. The woman has her hand on his chest, the tips of her fingers curling into the cloth of his robe. ‘If you show me your nest I bet there’s lost of things I could show you in return,’ she coos. This close he can smell her, her slick dripping down between her thighs. He feels his cock twitch even as his mind cringed back in disgust.

‘Take your hand off the Supreme Leader, Ensign Koyss,’ Hux’s sharp, cold little voice snaps from somewhere behind them.

‘Hux,’ she hisses, the fingers on his chest clenching into claws, digging into the armour beneath the robe. There is no deference there, she does not speak as if talking to an omega higher on the food chain, instead she sounds very much like she thinks of herself as Hux’s rival. It’s funny. So funny he finds himself laughing before casually pushing the woman away, not even with the Force, just with a shove of his hand. Her head whips around to face him as she falls, a look of outrage on her pretty features. She hisses, the sickly sweet of her scent turning sour. Omega distressed. Omega angry.

He turns to go and as he does so he hears her begin to make the high-pitched growl of an omega in threat display, before it drops, gets deeper, and then he turns, prepared to strike her down as she attacks, but it’s not him she’s lurching for. It’s Hux. 

Face impassive the redhead dodges her first, barely coordinated blow, moves around her second, grabs her by the back of her head, pale fingers tangling into dark hair, and slams her head against the wall with a hollow _thunk._ Once, twice— the darkhaired omega goes still, the thrum of her consciousness in the Force quietens. Hux drops her, unconscious, uncaring if she’s further damaged as she falls. One long, pale finger goes to the redhead’s ear and then Hux is ordering meddroids to come and deal with her. 

Those pale eyes meet his for a moment, expressionless, and then the redhead simply brushes past and continues on towards the mess hall. He glances down at the fallen omega for a moment and then follows after, thinking once more of the stew. 

If only everything could be so simple.

In the next few days more and more omegas go into heat, which has several consequences. The most alarming, the most _personal,_ one is that not only does he wake each morning mid thrust, and leave his bed each day sodden and stinking of come, but one night he wakes in the dark, alone, and finds himself upright in his rooms, gathering everything soft he has at hand— every old blanket, every robe, everything of cloth he owns— down to yesterday’s alpha reeking old underwear— and building a rudimentary nest in the corner of his bedroom between the berth and the wall. 

When he is done he stands over the mass of fabric, of clothes and bedding, so much of it stinking of his own sweat, his come, his alpha pheromones, and feels inadequate. It is not good enough. No omega would accept him if presented with this ramshackle excuse for a place to lie and be safe and be knotted. He destroys it in his wrath and barely keeps from turning that wrath against himself. 

He wants no omega. He wants no bitch to lie and soak his bedding with the stink of slick to meet and beat the stink of come he’s left behind. He wants Rey— and Rey would no more want a nest than he wants an omega, and even if he could convince her to humour him he know deep down inside that his sorry attempt at nest building is inferior to what she deserves. 

As his wrath cools he cleans up the mess he’s made and quietly curses his father, curses his mother, curses Luke. Han Solo was an alpha but not once did the man— _not once_ — take time out of his busy life of self-indulgence to give his own son the most _basic_ lessons in how to be an alpha. An alpha’s sire, if they themselves are an alpha, has a duty to their child to —at the very least— show them how to build a nest. The very least. In truth the whole pack has a duty to the next generation. But his mother is a beta, and Luke, Luke was an omega, and one so wedded to his suppressants and so far divorced from his own sex that he had nothing useful to teach anyone about the matter.

For a moment he remembers his own first stirrings of adolescent lust, the first time he saw his uncle and saw not his _uncle_ , but an omega, unmated, unknotted, and for a moment was captured by the fading beauty before him. Disgust stirs within him as it did then, disgust and self-hatred and anger, and the knowledge that he pushes down deep even as it stirs for the first time in years, that the first time he popped a knot he did it while thinking of his own mother’s twin. 

He punches the wall, hand unprotected, mind unfocused, and feels a pop, pop, pop, knuckles breaking.

It is as he leaves his rooms to go to the medibay to have his hand fixed that he comes across the first of the alphas gone into rut and conducting a challenge. He’s surprised it’s taken them this long in the face of all the provocation. In the days since the dark-haired omega approached him he has encountered more and more omegas walking the decks of the ship in heat, has been approached by many— though not all of them— and has seen or heard of multiple attempts by them to challenge Hux. 

The ones that approach him he quickly sees off— disgusted, so disgusted, skin crawling the entire time, every day, with every whiff of the smell of them— thankfully having to kill only one who refused to get the message, and he thinks they’re finally understanding he’s not interested, because the approaches, the looks, the deliberate wafting of pheromones in his direction are finally fading off. It doesn’t seem to have lessened their antipathy towards Hux though, even if the redhead has met every challenge victorious, and left every challenger to the tender mercies of the medidroids. Honestly, he’s surprised, he didn’t think the redhead was so capable. The omega population’s desire to destroy his General is becoming a problem however, and one he is afraid he may be reduced to fixing himself. 

Centring himself in the pain in his hand, letting it flow through him, strengthen his wrath and his resolve, is no match to the irritation he feels as he turns into a hall and comes across the two alphas. They’re posturing at each other, both puffed up, the female Stormtrooper with her helmet discarded against the wall so that the male officer that is her opponent can see her bare her teeth. Nearby he spots an omega— a spindly little blond officer— watching them with interest. The low thrum of their combined growls pauses for a moment as he appears on the scene, all three sets of eyes turning to pin him. 

Their body language is stiff, still, reading of threat. His own body starts to puff up, drawing in air, raising his shoulders, expanding upwards and outwards to the full size that so often a lifetime of feeling too big for the world still makes him instinctively try to hide. He watches pupils expand and contract, nostrils flare, hears a deep whuffing sound of contemplation from the female alpha, before both alphas lower their eyes a little, relax their postures, as a gesture of submission to make it clear neither has any idea of challenging him. For a moment he feels disappointed. His heartrate is up, blood pumping, excitement thrumming through him. He wants a fight. 

No. That’s not him. That’s not his usual bloodlust. That’s the alpha in him wanting to get out. He snorts out the air he was holding and makes himself walk past, listening to the sound of the two turning their attentions back to each other. As he nears the end of the hall he hears their bodies collide, chest to chest, posturing intensifying and well on its way to outright combat. The stink of omega slick gets stronger, sweeter, in response, and he could bet that whoever wins this battle will have caught the attentions of the weedy little blond. A few presents, a bit of attention, and soon enough the little officer will be following one of the two alphas back to their nest to be bred like the bitch he is. He doesn’t care enough to wait and see if the losing alpha survives the fight. 

In the days after the medidroids fix his hand he is confronted with another side effect of the omegas going into heat, one he really should have considered. As the alphas go into rut and challenge each other for status and mates some of them die, and the ones that are victorious, the ones that win all challenges and win the attentions of an omega (or, on occasion beta or even other alpha) disappear with their new mates into their rooms or whatever nook or cranny they’ve found to build a nest in. 

Perhaps he is unkind. It is not all challenges and bloodthirsty omegas, some relationships predate the current crisis and simply continue on without drama, some relationships are formed from pre-existing though unspoken attachment, some alphas and omegas form alliances, even groups, protecting each other from outside threats, protecting each other’s chosen mates from outside challengers. 

In some ways though, he is too kind. There are rapes. There are murders— murdered omegas, murdered betas, murdered alphas. Some are sexually motivated, raped before or after, often humiliated in death, sometimes mutilated. Some are those vying for power without the honour to conduct a proper challenge. When Hux complains about it all during one of their meetings he sets the redhead the task of catching anyone who commits such crimes. In truth he agrees with what the omega says, though perhaps it is only instinct talking. All agree that there is no crime in killing as a result of a challenge, but the rest of it— Some of it makes him shudder, a different kind of disgust to what he’s felt since the first whiff of omega pheromones in the air. 

In the following days some thirty-odd of the crew across all ships are executed personally by Hux, after extensive investigation that leaves the redhead pale and shocky, running around obviously without sleep. Most of the perpetrators, many more than he would have expected, turn out to be betas. 

This, and so many creeping off to nest, seems to empty the halls, the only alphas and omegas left all seem on edge, waiting for something. The thing is that many of the crew that vanish off to fuck or be fucked are vital to the running of the fleet, and some have no viable beta replacements. They huddle in the shadow of two old, dead and nameless worlds at the edge of the Outer Rim, and shut off unnecessary systems, automate what they can, the officers not affected running double, triple, shifts, Hux seeming to give up on the idea of sleep entirely in his desperation to keep the situation under control.

And then, inevitably, Hux himself goes into heat.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for the comments and all the kudos, honestly I'm so grateful and incredibly flattered. Here we have another chapter, I hope you all continue to enjoy it.

He wakes, jaw aching, cramping, something dry and strange in his mouth, between his teeth, back arched uncomfortably, cock burning, hips pressing down hard, hard, hard. A deep gasp as he spits the thing out and it’s his pillow, cover torn, foam filling ripped into by his own teeth. A hand, He gets a hand down there and on his knot and _squeezes_ and almost blacks out from the intensity of it, loses time, loses everything, until eventually another gasp, a desperate, pathetic moan, and it’s done. 

He lies there. Stunned by the intensity of it all. It can’t get any worse than this, more intense, can it? Why has it become so intense? Even the morning before, when he had momentarily considered shredding his berth as if it was the problem, an omega doing its best to trick him, to seduce him into knotting it, it had not been this bad. 

As he breathes he catches a change in the scent, something new, his nostrils flare, his lungs pump, bringing in as much air as they can while he tries to determine what has altered about the scent. There’s the raging fire of alphas in rut, the sourness of miserable omegas, the sweet musk of those in heat— but that sweet musk has changed, there’s another element overlaying it, a new scent, delicate, vegetal, like the bloom of some obscure water plant. He huffs out the air; must be the distinct scent of some particular omega who has finally gone off.

As he pulls himself from his berth he in confronted by the mess he has made in the night. The sheets and blankets are torn, discarded on the floor, the pillow is unsalvageable, and the mattress has what seem to be claw-marks _bite_ marks, all the way through the reinforced covering to reveal the gel beneath— now leaking down the side of the frame. He stands naked, unsure what happened to his sleeping clothes, and faced with the reality that it looks very much like he tried to sexually subjugate his own bed in his sleep. 

After arranging for everything to be replaced he bathes and dresses, briefly contemplates meditating, but the idea of trying to centre himself in the muddle of his current emotions is hardly appealing, so instead he leaves to go inspect the bridge. 

As he steps through the door a _tingle_ , a warning in the Force, just as he’s enveloped in a hot cloud of the stink of rut. He dodges the blaster shot, ignites his lightsabre, and whirls on his opponent, **thump,** only to feel a fist slam into his back over his kidney. His armour absorbs the jolt. He reaches back, grabs the wrist of the fist that struck him, pulls this opponent around and brings the lightsabre up to block another blaster bolt, another, another, another, coming from two different directions. 

The Stormtrooper in his grasp kicks out at his calf to destabilise him, but he cushions most of the impact with the Force, bringing the woman up so the next blaster bolt slams into her armour. The two shooting don’t care, he can detect no concern for their comrade in the Force. _Unhappy allies. Work together for now. Alone they have no chance against him. They must kill him. Whoever survives can fight amongst themselves. The victor can have Hux. Hux and the First Order._ Alphas. All three alphas. 

He brings the lightsabre up and under the Stormtrooper’s armour, through the soft spot under the arm, into her heart. As she convulses and her presence fades in the Force he reaches out and grabs the nearest other alpha, a handsome dark-skinned officer, drags them in with the Force, pulls his lightsabre from the body and directs its point at the throat so rapidly approaching. He senses the man’s awareness of his oncoming death, senses no regret, that all would have been worth it if they’d been victorious, senses the death as it envelopes that mind bright and burning with rut. 

He drops the two dead conspirators and rounds on the third. 

Another officer, tall, brunet, hand trembling a little on the hilt of his blaster. There is a moment of uncertainty, the rational, cautious mind of the man warring with his animal instincts, but then that mind surrenders, gives in under the sway of the knowledge that there’s no way the alpha is going to survive this, not after challenging him. The grip on the blaster firms, its barrel raises, the fingers begin to squeeze. One lunge forward and he buries his lightsabre in the man’s chest. Hazel eyes meet his own dark ones. ‘For the First Order,’ the man rasps out, life flickering in the Force, ‘For Hux!’ One last spasm of movement and a knife, pulled from the Force knows where, arcs up in a weak grasp towards his throat. He blocks it with the Force, pulls up on his lightsabre, watches the life finally drain from the man.

He drops his final opponent and steps back, looks around himself at the three dead alphas. It wasn’t even a proper challenge. They’d ambushed him. _Him._ They must have known they’d lose. What in all the hells is happening? 

The last one’s final words come to mind, then the image of Hux in their minds, burning beneath the fire of their rut. The omega can’t have set them against him, the redhead wouldn’t dare. If he has dared then—

His hand clenches on the hilt of his lightsabre as he storms through the ship to the bridge, the crazed flickering of its red light reflecting off every shiny surface he passes, from walls to floors, to shiny shoes, Stormtrooper armour, the trim on uniforms, the whites of the eyes of those who see him, stop, turn, flee. He burst onto the bridge to the sound of growling. His own and others.

Red. He sees red. Red everywhere. Hux’s red lips, the red blush suffused over pale cheeks, the red tips of pale ears sticking from dishevelled red hair, red rims around pale eyes. 

That new scent is stronger here, the smell of some exotic water blossom. The growling reaches a crescendo, figures lurch towards him, hands on blasters—

‘STAND DOWN!’ Hux roars, the sweet musk turning sour, almost metallic in its fierceness. 

Blasters drop. His own hand wavers, the grip on his lightsabre weakening, confusion— for the space of a blink or two he stands wavering, lacking entirely in purpose, and then his sense of self rushes back. He growls, low, threat obvious to all that hear. The alphas arrayed in defence of Hux before him shudder, lips twitching, fighting Hux’s command in their desire to bare their teeth at him.

‘I said _stand down,_ ’ the General repeats, voice calm, silky soft. 

A shudder passes through the alphas before they seem to force their bodies to relax, all eyes on him, even the eyes he can sense beneath Stormtrooper helmets. He huffs out a breath and lets himself straighten from his puffed up, head-lowered, threat pose. As he brings in the next breath it hits him, the problem. Hux is finally in heat.

He lashes out with the Force, curling it around the redhead, dragging him over and invading his mind. _Did Hux use his pheromones to manipulate the three alphas into attacking him?_ The omega struggles in his grip, kicking out, hands clawing at the curl of power enclosing him, the air of the bridge becoming thick, oppressive, strangling with the scent of the redhead’s distress. Alpha rut rises to match, the growls start up again, hands return to blasters. 

No. No, not even a deep, _invasive_ probe of the man’s mind reveals any plot against him. Only arousal and anger and fear and frustration and, overridingly, _humiliation_. He turns off his lightsabre. He drops Hux. The omega lands, awkwardly, alphas immediately rushing over to try and help him up. The General brushes them off, sits a moment longer, before making his unsteady way to his feet. 

‘May I ask what that was about?’ the redhead croaks, one hand going up to massage his throat, where a particularly tight tendril of the Force almost choked him.

He looks at the man, takes in what’s before him. As he saw before Hux is flushed, sweat beading across skin, dampening hairline. That usually neat red hair does not look so neat, nor does that usually immaculate uniform, but still Hux looks more composed than most omegas in heat he’s encountered, and there’s no visual evidence of slick wetting the crotch of his trousers, though— a deep sniff of the air, which makes the redhead’s face curl up in disgust— he can smell it, even through the stink of the omega’s distress. Hux must be doing something to absorb it. 

‘I was attacked,’ he replies. ‘Three cowards afraid to even issue a proper challenge.’

A twitch of a pale eyebrow. ‘They’re dead?’ the redhead queries. He confirms this. Hux nods. ‘And you think I had something to do with it?’ his tone as he speaks is odd, a glasslike fragility to it, something that feels like it will shatter easily and become both sharp and dangerous when it does. He does not understand. A sweep of the surface of Hux’s mind does not enlighten him, the man preoccupied with shame and recent pain and internal discomfort. 

‘I was not sure,’ he replies, ‘I am now. You did not.’

‘Then that’s ok then,’ the redhead replies, and again he cannot understand the man’s tone. 

All around them alphas are amassed, watching, tense. It’s abrupt. How aware of them he suddenly is. A quick scan of their minds and he reads their sense of himself as both rival and threat, their collective desire to each win Hux and lure the redhead off to their own sodden, come stinking nests. He growls, deep, a reminder of exactly who he is to them and exactly how powerful he is, how impossible to defeat. It barely deters them. As a collective, almost as a hive mind, they long to kill him.

It’s— disconcerting.

‘Get back to work!’ Hux orders, his own attention turned to the alphas crowding around them. A sullen pause, and then most peel off, slinking off into the shadows in a way that seems clear to him that they’ll return before long, once Hux has once more become distracted by the running of things. As the alphas leave they reveal omegas lurking at the edges of the space, some watching Hux with concern, some with naked antipathy, others with their attention on one or more of the alphas, or even some of the beta crew trapped in the middle of it all.

The redhead sighs as he watches them leave and it’s like the omega suddenly comes into focus, just for a second, and he sees a man exhausted, shadows under his eyes making the delicate flesh there seem bruised, bruised like the old bruises fading across his cheek and rising where the Force squeezed too tight. This is the man holding the fleet together— ‘Are you really up to this?’ he finds himself asking, concerned, ‘Shouldn’t you be—’

‘What?’ Hux scoffs, exhaustion leading to a moment of honesty that seems to startle the redhead as much as it does him ‘Head down, arse up, and mindlessly drooling while some alpha tries their best to get me pregnant?’ They look at each other for a moment, the words _not as long as one rebel scum remains alive to threaten my Galaxy_ passing over the surface of Hux’s mind, before renewed growling drags both their attention to the door. 

A pair of officers are squaring off. They must have come too close to each other as they left, or one or the other must have done something, some small, immaterial thing, to cause offense, because this, he can already tell, is the start of a challenge. They’re puffed up, heads down, bodies frozen, stiff, so very tense. 

The moment breaks. One rushes at the other, they collide, chest to chest, and begin circling each other, still growling, still showing teeth. They pull back, clash again, pull back, circle each other from a distance, before clashing once again, chest to chest. Locked together they begin to crab-walk back into the room, coming closer, approaching Hux, he realises, coming over to the omega, each with little on their minds but their desire to impress him. He reads their intention, glancing over at the redhead just as the two other alphas do, all of them suddenly absorbed in seeing how the omega will react. As their eyes meet his form the redhead very, very deliberately turns away from the scene, scent cold, hostile, dismissive. 

It’s like being slapped. 

He feels it as though it’s _him_ Hux is rejecting. As though the redhead is telling him he isn’t good enough. A growl slips out, small, plaintive, before he can bite it back. Still Hux does not relent, remains turned away, unreceptive. This is not the false rejection of an omega interested but trying to compel further attempts to impress before making up their mind. This is real rejection. The two alphas whine, to no avail. Hux pays none of them any heed, taking a datasheet from an alarmed beta and turning all his attention to what it says. Another whine. No response. The moment becomes still, everyone around watches, waits.

He feels it the moment the alphas give up. It’s crushing. He finds himself caught in their emotions, feeling their demoralization as if it was his own. _Not good enough, not good enough, not good enough_ echoes through all three of their minds, but in his it’s not just Hux telling him this, it’s Rey, it’s Luke, it’s his father, it’s his mother, it’s Snoke. _”You’re just a child, in a mask—“_ His fingers clench around the hilt of his lightsabre. 

Funny, it’s the other two alphas that drag him from his despair. The aggression between them fades and in its place an odd camaraderie rises. He turns in time to see one —the dark-haired woman with almost black eyes— bump her shoulder against the other one— a redhaired male with colouring more intense than Hux and a face full of freckles. Whatever passes between them is unspoken, communicated in scent and body language more than words or through the Force, but soon the two are leaving together, the intention to spend the day drinking, maybe find a beta or omega or two who are interested in spending the night but not mating. They’re sure they could show someone a good time. Even if they’re not good enough for Hux. It was a long shot anyway, even without the continued existence of _him,_ Dominant Alpha, the one with the first right to Hux, the two know they’re too far down the pack hierarchy to have a real shot with the redhead. Still— for a moment he’s caught by their wistfulness, a tiny, flickering dream of mating the most powerful omega in the First Order. He snorts out a breath, trying to expel with it the scent of omega slick, _Hux’s_ omega slick, that each of the two alphas imagine smeared across their faces as they use their mouths to—

‘Is there something you wanted—’ a pause, and then Hux adds, ‘Supreme Leader?’

‘Not at all,’ he replies after a moment, eyes still on the alphas as they disappear from sight, before turning his attention to the redhead and seeming to contradict himself. ‘Now, report.’


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNING: While there's actual no rape between Kylo and Hux, issues relating to rape and issues of consent will occur in this chapter, and later chapters, because of the nature of the world this fic is set in(such as: cultural expectations of omega and alpha behaviour, the nature of porn, the fear of rape, the thoughts and intentions and experiences of background characters, etc.) Also there will be use of misogynist language and Kylo behaving in an very unadmirable way. Furthermore if any of you think this fic needs further trigger warnings as it goes ahead do inform me and I'll update them.
> 
> So here we have another chapter. This fic is rapidly slipping any yoke I might have on it and getting thoroughly out of control, so there's that. Thank you all so much for reading, and your kudos and comments!

He wakes hot in the night, desperate, hard and throbbing, pre-come weeping from his dick like an infection. His quarters stink of rut, his own pheromones heavy and earthy, tinging on sour. The scent of omegas everywhere onboard, distressed, in heat, being knotted right now, seems thick on his tongue, the scent of Hux overlaying that, powerful and distinct. _Dominant Omega_ the water-blossom reek seems to scream, and with that the sense that he should be with Hux, between Hux’s thighs, slick with Hux’s juices, knotted up in the redhead’s guts. He is Dominant Alpha, and unless there’s some reason for the Dominant Alpha and Dominant Omega of a pack not to mate— like times packs are led by parent and child, by siblings, by other close family members with some scruples, by comrades with lesser ranked mates, even by pairs of betas or species without the same sub-genders as their own— biology calls for them to do so.

He growls at the darkness surrounding him, a momentary image of Hux naked and dripping crossing his mind, before he lurches from his berth and reaches wildly for the Force, turning it on the bed with no attempt at control, letting it rip the newly replaced thing to shreds and fling them against the walls as if a localised tornado had formed in his rooms. 

Rampant, erect, burning with his own hormones, he reaches for her with the Force, imagining Rey as the Dominant Omega of his pack, imagining his place as between her thighs, face buried in her cunt, painting his skin with her contained and less repulsively _extravagant_ slick. 

The rejection is like a slap in the face.

He collapses to his knees, punches the floor, again, again, again. _Pop._ A burst of pain across one of his recently healed knuckles. The urge to keep punching rises, but he fights it down. He kneels there, He breathes. For a moment his attention is caught on the spot on his arm where his rut suppressant implant sits; he rubs a finger over the spot, imagining he can feel it within, contaminating his flesh. No. No. He forces his hand away, forces down the impulse to just carve the useless thing from his flesh.

Eventually he reaches out for the Force, pulls it deep, suffuses himself with it. He cannot lose himself to rut, he must not lose himself to rut— the image crosses his mind of a ship full of omegas wet and wanting, of Hux in heat, of the highest-ranking omega a ripe fruit for him to sink his teeth into, sink his knot into, pump full of his come and his pups— No. No, never. In his weakness he leans on his power, praying to anything that will listen that the Force will be enough to preserve his rational mind. The power comes to him, blankets him, but the fear of what’s to come does not ease. He does not want to be in rut. Eventually he makes himself stand to summon droids to clean up this new mess and replace his berth once more.

In the morning when he steps onto the bridge, after he’s visited the medbay to have the droids fix his hand once more, the faintest scent of sexual satisfaction suffuses the air around Hux. He stills, bites back the growl that rises in his throat.

The growls around him begin once more, the lingering alphas puffing up in offense as he stalks across the bridge towards his General. He comes in close, so close his nose brushes the back of Hux’s neck, and breathes in deep. There is no smell of alpha, not even of _beta_ lingering around the redhead, but still he feels as if that sweetness added to that delicately sweet scent is an outright challenge. Who has fucked Hux? Who has dared to overstep their bounds? Whoever Hux takes to his bed will have reason to think they have a right to challenge him for control of the pack. 

The omega is tense in front of him, scent sour, fear palpable. ‘Is something the matter Supreme Leader?’ the redhead asks, voice a strangled hiss. 

He sniffs again, lets the tip of his nose brush through the coppery strands at the base of Hux’s neck— surprisingly soft. Still no other’s scent, still only the smell of Hux. The Force, he has no other choice. He tries not to, for years he has tried not to, but the old childish instinct to communicate with the Force, to live a life always brushing against the minds of others so he can understand their meaning, doesn’t have to rely on what he can read of face and body language and tone of voice, but rut makes that resolution weak, makes it so easy just to reach out. 

So he does. He reaches out, reaches into Hux, feels the redhead flinch and try to pull away, probes deep, searching, searching—

_Hux on his back on his own neat little berth. Frustration. Cannot sleep. Must sleep. It’s been so many days since this whole thing started. No more than moments of rest here and there for weeks, months, years before hand. Work, there’s always so much work to do. So much mess to clean up. Things just keep going wrong. He feels stretched so very thin, so tired, and with so little help. Even a few hours’ sleep would be enough. His judgement is becoming clouded. Arousal— nagging, hungry, burning in the pit of his belly. The whole world a mass of dicks, of knots, of things some part of himself longs to shove deep inside. And alphas, Everywhere alphas. Big alphas. Strong alphas. Dark eyed alphas. Dark haired alphas. Alphas with big, fat dicks and big fat knots and he can’t sleep like this. He can’t function like this. Needs must. That’s all it is. Nothing more than prescribed treatment for a condition. It doesn’t matter, it doesn’t ruin anything, the future he’s making for himself will still come to pass after this one moment of weakness. Hands wander down beneath soft sleep pants, fingers touch, prod, probe. Flesh is soft, wet, slick, warm, giving. One finger, two, hips arching up, body receptive, not enough. Not enough. Three. In and out, the preliminary, before the knot. Even if he’s never done it himself he has watched pornography, he wanted to know what to expect. Sour thoughts— omegas face down, makeup running, degraded, hands on their throats, half strangled, alphas spitting in their face, stuck on their knees, throats beings fucked, words spat out, whore, slut, cunt, I’ll knot your mouth, make you choke.  **Fear**. Never. Not him. Never. Never. No one would dare. Relax. Don’t think. In the here and now. His own fingers. In and out. In and out. Not enough. Body hungry. More. Four. In and out. No, Not enough. He needs a knot. He wants a knot. Body craving a knot. Desperate. Thumb tucked in and **push**. The whole lot pops in, body swallowing his own fist to the knuckles. Rearrange his body. Get his leg up. Shift about and there— now he’s comfortable. Does he dare? Yes. Yes he needs to sleep. Push a little more, feel his hand swallowed up to the wrist in the wet heat of himself, makes a fist, feels it lodge. He whines, humps his hips up, body receptive. Takes it. His own fist up inside—_

He pulls away, gasping. Dick swelling. He can smell himself, the stink of his own rut rising to smother the smell of the other alphas, he feels Hux go perfectly still, could swear he can feel the blood pulsing through Hux’s flesh as the redhead’s heartrate speeds up, then comes the stink, the overwhelming smell of sour, metallic distress. He snorts, trying to push it out of his nose, reeling back away from Hux, dick softening in response. 

‘This can’t go on,’ he mutters, raising a hand to scrub at his nose. ‘We need to separate the crew. Omegas on one ship, alphas on another, betas to crew both, and mated pairs— I don’t know, on another ship. Any ship. Just as long as I don’t have to smell them.’

There is a pause, then the General speaks, scent still unpleasant, still distressed. ‘I’m afraid it won’t work Supreme Leader. If we separate the crew as you suggest it will just lead to violence, alphas killing alphas, omegas killing omegas, and I do not believe they will follow our orders to remain separated for long.’

He lets the words sink in for a moment. ‘Then I need to get out of here. I’ll take my shuttle, comm me when this is all over.’

‘No,’ Hux says.

‘That wasn’t a suggestion,’ he snaps, whirling on the man, leaning in close, threatening, ignoring the growls that rise behind him and the sharp stink of Hux’s fear. 

‘No,’ Hux repeats, meeting his gaze, dark eyes to pale ones. ‘You cannot do this, you cannot just walk away from the mess you have made.’

‘ _My_ mess!’ he snaps, even though he knows Hux to be right —this all came about because he killed Snoke— but the redhead is not listening to his objections, is instead still talking, quietly, as if to shield his words from the crew overhearing.

‘If you leave now the First Order will fall apart, this will be the end of us all, everything I— _we_ have worked so hard for. We must weather this storm, and the only way we can do so is for you to remain and to take some fucking responsibility for once! You call yourself Supreme Leader and yet you do nothing. You sulk about my ship, killing my crew and destroying my equipment and leaving me to try and fix everything, run everything, do everything. When you killed Snoke I had thought—’

‘Thought what?’ he hisses, outraged at Hux’s audacity, that the omega should dress him down like this, like he is some bottom-of-the-food-chain knot-head, good for nothing but mindless violence and physical labour. 

Hux takes a deep breath, composes himself. ‘It little matters, what does matter is the fact that if you walk out now there will be no First Order for you to return to. Word of what has happened here will spread from these ships to all our allies in the Galaxy and everyone will split themselves apart under rival leaders while you will be dismissed as a jumped up, good for nothing, _child_ playing at being an alpha.’

It stings, again a reminder. ‘You worthless little _cunt,_ ’ he breathes out. ‘How dare you speak to me like this.’

A snorted in breath from Hux, that sour scent of distress thickening, becoming heavy with rage. He sees the redhead’s lips quiver, not as though the man is about to cry, but as if Hux is biting back further words. Eventually the redhead bites out the words, ‘Disregard me if you chose, but on your head be it.’

He huffs out a breath, hating that he knows Hux is right, hating that he’s managed to trap himself, for a moment even wishing he’d never struck down Snoke. But no, the sense of triumph there quickly floods back, intensified by the hormones of rut. He is now Dominant Alpha, he reminds himself of that, undeniably Dominant Alpha of his own —very large— pack. He has outdone even his own father. It was worth it. It was all worth it to get out from under any other alpha’s yoke.

‘I should just snap your neck right now and be done with it,’ he says, a reminder to Hux of exactly who is in charge, and when the redhead simply pales a little further, something he would not have thought possible, but says nothing more, he adds quietly, ‘You win. I will stay. Though do me a favour by not coming to the bridge stinking like you’ve spent the night fucking yourself in the future.’

Pale skin flushes, Hux’s stink becomes tainted by shame, the redhead looks away, throat bobbing as he swallows harshly. It’s fascinating, the movement of that long, pale neck. For a moment he’s transfixed, staring, until Hux’s eyes flick to meet his and he feels a terrible compulsion to look away. He fights it, stares the redhead down for a moment until Hux averts his gaze once more, then turns to leave, passing beneath the gaze of alphas, betas, omegas, so many with unreadable faces.

That night there’s an explosion in Hux’s quarters.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm posting this in a bit of a hurry, so I'll just say a quick thank you to everyone who has been reading, leaving comments and kudos, and a hello and welcome to anyone who is new! I really do appreciate all your encouragement!

He wakes when the blast rocks through the ship. Panic and alarm and _Rey,_ she’s come back for him, she’s led the rebels to him, she’s come to kill him, she’s— he reaches for her, banging up against the wall she’s erected between them. Scrabbling at it momentarily before— No. No. It’s not her, he can’t even sense her anywhere nearby. What’s going on?

Dragging himself from his newest new berth he comms the bridge, bellowing the question at the alarmed beta that answers. 

‘Ah,’ she stutters. ‘Ah, there’s been an explosion Sir.’

‘I can tell that much already,’ he snarls, dragging his sleep pants up his thighs from where they’ve tangled around his knees and pulling his lightsabre to him with the Force. Does he have time to put on his armour? ‘There’s been an explosion where?’

‘Um,’ she whispers, and he’s not sure if it’s the Force or her tone but he can feel her fear, almost as if she’s in the room with him. ‘In General Hux’s quarters. Sir.’

‘What?’ he snarls. ‘Where’s Hux? Is he hurt?’

‘I don’t know Sir,’ she yelps. Fuck his fucking armour. 

Barefoot and furious he storms out of his rooms and heads towards Hux’s, lightsabre in hand and the residue of dreams and rut leaving his dick hard as a fucking rock and making movement awkward. There’s smoke in the halls, the whine of the air filtration system as it speeds up in an attempt to clear it, the clamour of voices. Alphas, betas, omegas, officers, techs, and soldiers in the halls, confusion in the air, clouding the Force. He reaches through it for Hux, trying to remember what the man feels like. He thinks he senses life, but he’s sure he doesn’t sense consciousness. The General is probably injured. What in all the hells is going on?

Alphas that have crept out of their nests to determine if there’s a threat to their mates growl at him as he passes, as do omegas, and even some betas. The air is thick with hostility, suspicion. In more than one mind he reads the intention to take their mate and flee to the nearest escape pod, and even his command to the bridge staff to issue the warning of ‘Any vessel caught deserting the fleet will be fired on!’ does little to dampen the impulse.

The confusion worsens the closer he gets to Hux’s quarters, two decks up and much closer to the bridge than he would ever want his to be. The smoke is thick here, choking, and he uses the Force to try and filter out the worst of it before he pulls it into his lungs. There are dead bodies here, in the halls, though not many and most seeming to have died of smoke inhalation or suffocation in the first over-active impulse of the fire suppression system. The bulkhead doors had naturally shut at the explosion, but as the hull hadn’t been breached it was only too easy, once the fire was supressed, for them to be coaxed open by the small group of omegas, betas and alphas he finds arrayed in protection around Hux halfway down the hall from the smoking ruin of what was the redhead’s door.

The omega is floating somewhere between unconsciousness and semi-consciousness, lying slumped against the wall, blaster barely grasped in one limp hand and a delicate little copper coloured personal gas-and-particulate air scrubber strapped over mouth and nose. There are burns, he sees, though not bad ones, to the side of Hux’s face, to one arm from shoulder to hand, though the General’s heavy greatcoat seems to have taken most of the damage. 

As he steps towards Hux, probing the man’s presence in the Force, trying to determine what happened and how badly Hux is injured, the little collection of loyal packmates bristle. They all stare at him, growl at him, bodies stiff, teeth bared, blasters pointed in his direction. He reads it in their minds, they will happily die for Hux, die to protect their Dominant Omega from the threat he represents. 

_Rage._ How dare they? For a moment he is tempted to wipe them all from existence, they must know he means Hux no harm yet they— No. The voice of rut comes screaming from the back of his mind, the voice of his instincts. They are not trying to challenge him, they are trying to protect a valuable member of his pack. His wrath is unjustifiable. He shakes his head, tries to shake his thinking clear. Human and alpha war inside him, but he reminds himself that the most important thing right now is to work out what’s happened, ensure Hux’s safety, and punish whoever did this if this was done deliberately.

He carefully lowers the hand holding the lightsabre, opens his body language, approaches cautiously, making it clear he’s not a threat, but at the same time not lowering himself to creep forward submissively. He needs them to remember who he is, the power he has over them. The growling continues, the stink of all three sub-genders in distress almost as choking as the smoke. 

‘I will not hurt him,’ he says, trying his best to project the air of a concerned Dominant Alpha. ‘I promise, I will not hurt him.’

The leader of the group, a little dark-haired omega officer that looks faintly familiar, scoffs, but still the group doesn’t attack as he moves in closer. They don’t relax either, nor does the grips on their blasters. 

Hux’s lifeforce is still strong in the Force, though his flutterings of awareness are losing the battle, and as the seconds pass Hux slips from his semi-lucid state into full unconsciousness. As it happens he lurches forward a step, feeling the man’s mind slip over the edge of that abyss, before sense tells him he has nothing to be alarmed about. Hux still glows bright, alive, before him. ‘What happened?’ he asks the group.

The little dark-haired officer is the one who answers. ‘We are not sure. A bomb is the current best guess. We were coming back from visiting Captain Phasma in the medbay—’ the man’s mind makes it clear he means himself and Hux, not the entire group, who had been visiting the injured omega. _A flash of memory, burn scars tight and shiny, scalp bare bar a few patches of shirt blond hair, satisfaction in Hux’s eyes, his scent, at the progress she’s making with the prostheses he has built for her, rage shared between all of them at the destruction the New Republic, the Resistance, has caused, frustration at the current situation, a kind of friendly envy that Phasma’s injures have prevented her body from following along into heat, as well as her commiseration that they have not been so lucky._ ‘— and I had turned down the hall to my rooms and was almost at my door when the explosion happened.’

‘You didn’t see it?’ he asks. The omega shakes his head. ‘Did any of you see anything?’ he asks the rest.

Heads shake amidst a smattering of “Nos.” He double checks in the Force, they are not lying to him, their memories speak of confusion, alarm, of finding Hux where he lies now and determining to give their lives to guard him. ‘Supreme Leader,’ the omega officer ventures after a moment. ‘The visit to Captain Phasma was spur-of-the-moment. I believe that if it had not occurred the General would have been in his rooms, instead of only just approaching them, when the explosion occurred.’

He glances from Hux to the smoke billowing out of Hux’s door— a bomb— If they’re correct then this is an undeniable assassination attempt aimed at his second in command. He glances back at the array of packmates in defence of Hux. Can they be trusted? He probes at their minds, digging in deep to examine their intentions, their feelings towards the redhead. Yes. They can be trusted to keep Hux safe. Almost as a whole he senses the truth of their intention to die for the redhead, it’s not just surface thoughts but real intensions, even in the alphas, and few betas and omegas, that also harbour fantasies of fucking his General. This is loyalty that is not matched in their feelings towards him. _Hostility._ He has no friends amongst this group. He bites down the anger that rises to meet the thought. 

Hux cannot remain in the hall all night, the man needs treatment for those burns, for what is probably a concussion, for whatever injury to Hux’s side he is only just now noticing his General has curled protectively around. He comms the medbay, orders droids to his position to transport his General. ‘I am trusting you to guard him,’ he warns the group. ‘No harm must come to him.’ On that note he comms the bridge to get the message relayed around the ship. _Hux is to be protected, any attack on his General is an attack on both him and the First Order and will be seen as treason._

He waits only for the droids to arrive before turning his attention to Hux’s door. He approaches, probing for any sign of life within. None. The smoke is starting to die down, the filters clearing it from the air, but the space inside the blasted out door is still grey and hazy. Before stepping inside he does his best to weave the Force into better protection for both lungs and eyes, but this has never been a great talent of his so his vision wavers as his eyes water and he has to fight the impulse to cough as he stalks around his General’s rooms looking for the epicentre of the blast. It doesn’t take him long to find it. 

A blackened spot on the floor, melted glass and steel within, Hux’s desk, he’d guess, from its location and the presence of an office chair, half melted and propelled violently backwards on its wheels when the explosion occurred. He stands there, looks at the scrap of melted metal, thinks of Hux, workaholic Hux, retiring to his rooms to read the days reports before— Anger surges in him. There can be no doubt this was an assassination attempt. Now to find those responsible. 

He has no idea where to start. 

Either the perpetrator has left no residue of self in Hux’s rooms he can sense through the Force, or his capacity to sense such things is not as finely tuned as Snoke’s, or Luke’s. He comms the bridge to send techs to comb over every millimetre of the place for evidence, but it’s frustrating, it will take too long. He needs to do something now. Ultimately his best bet is to pace the halls, to use the Force to find some hint of guilt, to chase down whoever has done this, probe their mind for further conspirators, track any he finds down, and then summon everyone on board, set up drones to record and play the footage on the other ships, and have a public execution. He will rip them apart with the Force, that should make any future traitors more wary. 

Time to begin.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we have another chapter, I hope you all like it. Thank you so much for all your comments and kudos, and for reading my fic. I hope you are all doing alright in these difficult times, that you are all safe and that the worlds is showing you kindness.

So far he has discovered nothing, no sign of any conspirators in the conspicuously empty halls or the rooms behind shut— and frequently barred— doors. He’s on the comms to the medbay demanding to know if there’s any word on Hux’s status, having heard nothing and for far too long, when the alpha appears. Tall, strong, handsome in a conventional way, a very much _Core Worlds_ way, the officer has teeth bared as the man strides down the hall towards him. At first he doesn’t realise this is a challenge, attention on the droid’s irritated reassurances that Hux is alive and is being stabilised as they speak, that his hearing has been fixed and the broken ribs and concussion are nothing, easily treated, but the man sidesteps in front of him as he intends to stride past. He stops. 

The Lieutenant’s head is down, teeth bared, shoulders up, body puffed up, tense. Growling, low and threatening. 

‘Get out of my way,’ he orders, cutting the comm to the medbay, his own lip curling back to reveal his own teeth. He doesn’t have time for this. He must discover whoever planted the bomb.

‘This is your fault,’ the man replies in an accent that might just be posher than Hux’s. 

‘I said get out of my way,’ he snarls, reaching with the Force and wrapping it around the man, preparing to slam him into the wall.

‘I challenge you Kylo Ren!’ the man shouts. He pauses, the officer tangled in his grasp. A challenge? He feels no hint that this man is involved in the plot against Hux, but why else would he issue a challenge. He digs in deep, probing the man’s mind but finds no evidence, not even the faintest desire to kill his General. Sounding strangled, cringing from his mind being so roughly probed, the alpha continues. ‘I challenge you in the old way, the formal way of my people and of the Empire. Surely even you can’t be so without honour that you’d ignore such a challenge?’

‘You will lose,’ he replies, a simple statement of fact. 

‘So be it,’ the man snarls, ‘But at least I shall go to my death with my honour intact.’

‘Honour?’ he scoffs. ‘What a useless concept,’ he drops the man, ‘good for nothing but leading fools to an early grave.’ He feels that excitement rise again, lust for violence, alpha against alpha. Part of it’s rut. A lot of it’s his own base, alpha instincts. The rest though, that’s all him. He tells himself he needs to find out what’s happening, he needs to properly check on Hux, he needs to find the guilty parties, to kill them, but the prospect of sooner violence— It is all too tempting. He throws his lightsabre to the side, bare fists clenching, relaxing, clenching. ‘Fine. I accept your challenge.’

There’s none of that circling and posturing, the officer’s declaration of challenge beforehand making it unnecessary. The upper classes of the Core Worlds always did like to imagine themselves more civilised than the rest of the galaxy, more divorced in their complicated layers of protocol from their baser, animal, instincts. The Lieutenant rushes him, he resists, they grapple, but even without using the Force he is larger, stronger, and better trained. It doesn’t take long to get the upper hand, and for a moment he glories in it, the simple show of physical strength divorced from any of the deeper implications of a battle with another Force user. As he knocks the man down, as he pins him, is fought off, pins him again, is fought off, as they circle each other waiting for the perfect moment to strike, he feels the man’s fury at losing, his rage and condemnation. He thinks about breaking the officer’s neck, about choking him, about ripping his throat out with his teeth and bathing in the blood. Finally he gets the man pinned face down on the ground, his own large hand grinding the alpha’s face into the floor. ‘Is your honour still worth it?’ he asks, ‘Is this how you imagined dying, face down in the dirt?’

The officer grunts, struggling beneath his weight, hands flailing back to strike at him ineffectually. ‘I have no regrets,’ the man manages to groan out. ‘Any chance to bring you down—’

Again the sense of recrimination. He doesn’t understand it. ‘Why?’ he asks, but doesn’t wait for an answer, just pushes back into the man’s mind with the Force. _Fury, that’s the first thing he feels, fury and resentment and misery at defeat. The First Order is failing, falling, disintegrating into corruption, into inequality, into everything the officer, Lieutenant Dederis Kanron-Viellio, has fought against his whole career. An image of Hux, a younger man, face still unlined, eyes bright with hope, speaking to a crown of likeminded young people of the future, the future for all of them, where sex and gender and sexual preference, or lack thereof, does not bar their advancement and sit like a shackle around their ankles— he has an image of this alpha he has pinned beneath him pinned beneath another alpha, context different, clothes missing, the feel of a knot, fat and thick and perfect and aching and burning and splitting him open and all he wants from now until eternity, and with it so much shame and the knowledge that if his sire finds out the older alpha will kill him and the world he grew up on won’t even blink an eye and the New Republic will do nothing to stop it happening—_ ‘You don’t even want to fuck him, you’re one of **those** alphas,’ he finds himself musing, _—and still the fury makes no sense to him, so he tracks it down, follows it back through the alpha’s mind, to memories. Memories first of Snoke, but then of him, memories of Hux being struck, strangled, thrown around, talked down to, dismissed, treated with a complete and utter lack of respect for all that the redhead is the highest-ranking omega in the First Order, and it’s just like everywhere else, isn’t it? It’s just like being part of the New Republic with their insistence on respecting the local traditions of worlds where those traditions are enforcing inequality and ruining or taking the lives of some of the local people, people who have done nothing to bring such suffering down of their heads, and he hears his own voice, hears the words **”You worthless little cunt,”** and **“I should just snap your neck right now and be done with it,”** and **”do me a favour by not coming to the bridge stinking like you’ve spent the night fucking yourself in the future”** and feels the fury rise at the disrespect, at the denigration, at the knowledge that this will add fuel to the fire burning within the anti-Hux faction—_

‘What anti-Hux faction?’ he asks, probing at that thought. _He feels the officer’s knowledge of a growing discontent amongst some of the ranks of all sub-genders, though strongest amongst the omegas. Pre-existing criticisms of everything Hux stands for combined with a sense of his weakness, his repeated public humiliations, and above all else the sense that neither of the last two Dominant Alphas have had any esteem whatsoever for the redhead and would not care, would actually be pleased, if the General were to die. Words whispered, **he is unworthy, he should be replaced** , and underneath all that the sense of individual omegas feeling that they above all others should be the ones to replace him. _

He snorts out a laugh, fucking presumptuous. The wilful ignorance, arrogance, of omegas, what in all the hells gave them the idea he would tolerate anyone other than Hux being so far high up the pecking order? Hux he knows, Hux he can deal with, Hux knows his place enough not to try and use what’s between his legs for personal advancement. He finds some sympathy in the anger the alpha beneath him has for those trying to reach so high in the hierarchy without doing anything to earn it. 

For a moment he’s almost fond of this strange, pompous man willing to die for Hux’s few shreds of honour without even wanted to stick his knot up the redhead. ‘Do you yield?’ he asks on impulse. 

The officer startles, not expecting the question, fight momentarily going out of him. ‘Pardon?’

It’s odd, it’s been many years since he’s given any serious thought to showing mercy to someone, other than Rey (other than his mother(other than his father)), but in this moment— perhaps it’s just coming mind to mind with another alpha whose fantasies don’t revolve around drowning themselves in omega slick. ‘If you yield, if you recognise my authority, I will let you live,’ he says softly in the man’s ear. He feels the reaction, the shudder run through the officer, distracted from his intention of violence in the moment and suddenly aware of the hot, heavy weight of a bigger, stronger alpha pinning him down. A tiny burst of arousal, then it’s bitten back, no match for the anger still there. There’s an odd thrill, the power of being desirable. Not something he’s felt all that often before recently, and recently it has been omegas in heat and not something that makes him feel good about himself. 

‘Why should I?’ the man grinds out, face still pressed to the shiny floor slick with his blood. 

‘Because you’ve lost,’ he says, simply. ‘You can die or you can yield, and if you yield I’ll let you help me avenge your precious Hux. You’d like to see his enemies executed, I can read it in your mind.’

A moment, he feels the man contemplating the offer. They both know the other alpha’s honour would not be damaged by it, not all challenges end in death after all. They fought, the other alpha lost, he has proven his superiority, it is appropriate that the other man should now fall into line— but the rage is still there, and worsened by rut and frustration and the want to both fight and fuck and especially be fucked and the shame that still prevents the alpha from seeking it out publicly. A flickering thought. _Hux’s Utopia has not yet arrived._

‘And it never will if people think they can so easily kill my General without punishment,’ he snarls into the alpha’s ear. 

‘Why should I even believe that you care what happens to General Hux?’ the alpha hisses out, fidgeting beneath his weight, but not yet trying once more to buck him off.

He can’t answer that beyond the unflattering statement of ‘Because he’s _mine_ and the First Order is _mine_ and you are all _mine_ and I will not have my dominance questioned by people trying to dispose of my property without my permission.’

He feels the words strike something at the core of the other alpha, alpha mind to alpha mind, alpha reasoning resonating, and feels a moment of wavering, but ultimately it is discarded. The man beneath him, the alpha he has pinned, does not trust his word— something deep down inside cries out at that, shudders with the sense that his own pack feel they cannot rely on him to lead them, protect them. Anger rises, for a moment he’s on the knifedge, the intent to kill this alpha making him feel so bad about himself rising, but as the other man speaks, says simply ‘I do not yield’ he forces himself to remember the instinct to mercy he felt earlier. A punch, hard and in the right place, and the alpha loses consciousness. 

He has won. Perhaps it is not so definitive a victory as one that ends in the opponent dead or having formally yielded, but he has still won, and it is the other alpha and not himself who will walk away from this moment with the taint of shame. He has shown mercy, the other alpha has received that mercy even though it was not wanted. He comms the medbay to order another droid to fetch the unconscious Lieutenant and moves on.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNING: There will be some discussion of rape in this chapter- by which I mean stuff Kylo reads in other character's minds. Part of it will be related to rape as punishment. No one will actually be raped. It's a bit unpleasant though. 
> 
> I am so very pleased by the reception this fic has gotten; you are all such a lovely audience. Thank you so much for reading it, for reviewing and leaving comments. I know my thanks might get repetitive, but it's important to me to let you know how much I appreciate you all.

A hint of something. Anticipation, the edge of fear, something like guilt, but not so much guilt as the fear of getting in trouble. In the Force the sensation is almost as if someone nearby suddenly holds their breath, hoping he’ll walk past without them being heard. His head whips around, narrows in on the source of that sensation. That way. He chases it, faint though it is, chases it down the empty halls, all the mated alphas and omegas (and betas) once more tucked up in their nests, the unmated ones shivering in their berths. He wonders if they can smell him, his rage heavy in the air like the stink of the oncoming storm. His anger right now is a cool thing, a composed thing. He suspects it will not remain that way.

The room the Force leads him to is a low-ranking officer’s quarters, the same as a myriad of low-ranking officer’s quarters he has passed, locked against intruders. He doesn’t knock. He can feel a kind of skittering excitement within, fear and dread and hope all tangled together, the image of Hux vaporising into a red spray of blood and pulverised tissue lingering on the surface of the mind within. Reinforced though it is the door is no match for his lightsabre, and he steps inside to the stink of an agitated omega, the scent vacillating wildly between intense arousal and the inevitable fear. It makes him snort, burns his nose. 

‘Is he dead?’ the omega, a brunet with the kind of perfect looks that suggest some form of artificial enhancement. More than a hint of unnatural swelling to the lips, a forehead perfectly without lines, skin soft and smooth and poreless and with an appearance that makes him think of sticky, sloppy, uncooked and badly prepared dough the one time his mother had turned her hand at cooking from scratch, before giving up and resigning the family once more to a life of food that was either premade and reheated, prepared by a droid, ordered in, or eaten at restaurants. Or cooked by his uncle, who had ever been amused by both of his parents’ apparent inability to even feed themselves without help. 

‘No,’ he replies, watching the young man. 

A sneer drifts across those unnaturally full lips. ‘A pity.’ He can feel that the omega means it. It’s strange, even after what he’d taken from Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio’s mind he hadn’t really considered that whoever planted the bomb might be an omega. Part of him hadn’t truly considered a member of that sub-gender might be capable of such viciousness. Was it really this pretty brunet’s plot? He lashes out, wraps the Force around the omega, pries into his mind. There are others, other omegas, betas, a handful of alphas, all gone to ground, hiding, but the bomb, that was the brainchild of this omega and another one, a female tech. 

‘Why?’ he asks. He’s going to have to kill them all, he waits for the excitement to rise, but it doesn’t, not really. Snoke was right whenever the man had pointed it out, and the old Dominant Alpha had loved to highlight his weaknesses, killing omegas has always made him feel uncomfortable. Even the first time, at the temple— and he forces himself not to remember names and faces, his fellow students. He reaches for the Force, for the Dark, infuses himself with it. Draws strength. 

The omega laughs, oddly composed. The man’s mind is growing still, calm, a strange lassitude slipping over him. He realises that the omega knows he’s going to die and at this moment doesn’t care. It’s a feeling he himself has felt before, everything’s gone on too far, there’s no going back. The scent of smoke teases his nose, and for a moment he’s not sure if it’s a memory or the smell lingering in his hair, on his skin, from Hux’s rooms. 

‘I can’t believe you of all people have to ask that,’ the omega says in his own exceedingly posh Core World accent, ‘Surely you must know why? You said it yourself; Hux is a worthless cunt— a frigid, lowborn bastard. What right does a man like that have to act like he’s our Dominant Omega? If he’d earnt it on his back that would be a different matter, but the man lords it over us all with no competency and no biological right—’ and here he can feel a contradiction in thought, _even if Hux was the Dominant Omega mate of the Dominant Alpha this omega wouldn’t accept him, would never accept him. What he is, where he comes from, the taint of blood and birth, combined with ambition of the type that rarely lends itself to cooperation, to wheedling for favours, to sycophancy unless death is the alternative, and that brutal, knife-sharp intelligence, and Hux’s lack of shame in that intelligence, and the way he so proudly wields it to further the aims of the First Order, and puts himself so eagerly forward without shying back, and the fact that Hux worked his way up so high under Snoke without even spreading his legs— as if such a thing should ever be possible for an omega— and worst of all the way Hux seems to look down on other omegas— so prudish, never open to a friendly (or not so friendly) omega bonding fuck—though they’d all heard what he’s said to the redhead yesterday and laughed about the amusing implications of it— and never one to use the power nature gave him over alphas to get his way._

It’s odd. The image this omega has in his mind of Hux does not match the man he knows or the mind he has occasionally brushed up against, certainly he’s never seen or sensed any contempt towards other omegas from Hux, and the rest of it— ‘You’re envious of him,’ he breathes out. The calm inside the omega’s mind breaks at this insult, his scent becoming raucous, sour, sharp. 

‘I am not!’ the omega snaps. ‘There is nothing to be envious of there. Hux is nothing. You know he is nothing, Supreme Leader Snoke knew the same.’

‘And yet he’s my General and you are only—’ his eyes glance over the uniform. ‘An Ensign. Tell me about the other conspirators.’

‘I would rather die!’ the omega declares, though his resolution does not feel very strong.

‘I’m afraid dying isn’t optional at this point. You tell me or I take the information from your mind— though in reality it’s probably going to be a bit of both, doesn’t matter, you all signed your death warrant when you moved against my General.’

‘I don’t—’ the omega’s voice cracks a little, that scent of distress so strong it feels he’ll choke on it. ‘I don’t understand. We all agreed you couldn’t move against Hux yourself, it would be unseemly if you were seen killing the old Dominant Omega so soon after taking Snoke’s place when you could simply mate him and bring him into line that way, but we were sure you would be glad to be rid of him. Of course you would have to make some display of sorrow for his death, maybe blame Resistance spies, maybe execute some scapegoats, but we— _I_ was sure we would be rewarded— but your anger is not just for show. I could smell it on you the moment you broke through my door. I just don’t understand it.’ The trace memories of a fantasy now turning sour, himself as seen through the eyes of this omega, _big, strong, so very strong, so very powerful, pinning the man down, teeth sunk into the back of the omega’s fragile neck, knot lodged up inside._ The omega wanted Hux’s place, and more than that wanted to earn it in the old-fashioned way, the only way this particular omega could really comprehend to gain rank. 

He snorts with disgust. ‘Your lack of understanding is pretty clear at this point.’ In the back of his mind he can feel this niggling sense, something like guilt, something like culpability, but now is not the time to worry about it. He can think on what he took from the mind of this Ensign, the Lieutenant earlier, later. When it’s all done. ‘Now, your co-conspirators—’

He presses into the omega’s mind, searching memories for names and faces, motivations and actions. _The Ensign (Bassen Trenq) and the tech(Mettho Ansuis), omegas from the same community on the same world, are the ringleaders. They have three other omega followers, all five omegas well aware that once Hux is out of the way any alliance they have will disintegrate into competition to earn _his_ favour and promotion to Dominant Omega. They also have two alphas, both of which dismiss Hux as uppity and as not knowing his place, but at the same time have been consistently reluctant to act in any way that might involve them being forced to bring any kind of physical harm to the omega themselves— partly why the bomb idea became so popular, Hux could be killed from a distance without any of them getting omega blood directly on their hands. The other five are betas, and here he flinches back, because he can read in the memory of this omega a promise given back in the early planning of the attack, before everyone decided on the bomb, a promise given not just by the omega himself, but by all but one of the other omegas where the alphas couldn’t hear, that if it came down to physically subduing Hux and killing him then they would give him over to the three male betas for **use.** There’s a complicated tangle of feelings there in the omega’s mind, a kind of fear and guilt and shame and titillation and arousal at the thought of Hux being raped —not just raped, but raped by **betas** and more than one of them at once— but forefront is a deep pleasure at the idea of Hux being so humiliated before, during, even **after** death._

The tangle of the Force tightens down on the body of the omega, making him squeak as breath is pushed from his lungs. He feels as if he is very far away, lost. For a moment he wants his mother, wants Luke, wants more than anything to be a child and huddled in their arms as they keep him safe from it all, all the horrors. His mind feels like it’s rattling in his skull, the Force, so deeply is he drawing from it, trying to gain any strength from it. The omega must see something, smell something, sense something, because that stillness comes back, that resolution, and the Ensign hisses the words ‘2231BT Code AH183W26 —’ He feels a spark, something electronic waking up, instinctively tightening down with the Force so it’s with the last of his breath that omega squeaks out, ‘—W’were wrong. Ren enemy. Identities discovered. Move against Hux.’

‘Affirmative,’ a pleasant, female voice answers from the tiny private handsfree comm device hidden beneath the collar of the omega’s uniform. ‘You will be avenged.’

Smugness. The sense of victory in that suffocating mind. Fuck waiting for a public execution. He clenches his fist, clenches the Force with the action, rips the omega to shreds. The blood is warm. A fine mist on his bare skin. 

He breathes, sucks in one deep breath, another. _Move against Hux._ Before thought he’s back out in the hall, heading for the medbay. He can’t even order backup, he can’t even be sure of the loyalty of his soldiers, any one of them he sends to the medbay to protect his General might turn on the man, might slaughter him while he’s injured and defenceless. If he doesn’t get there in time he can only hope the small group he found huddling around the omega are still with him, that their determination to protect his General with their lives was more than a product of the moment. 

He is furious. Absolutely furious. Anger beyond anger. Drawing so deep on the Force, on the Dark Side, that it burns, makes him nauseous, gives him something like double vision. He pushes his body as hard as he can, channelling the Force into his own flesh to try and compensate for its own weaknesses. The first time he had tried this was on Starkiller Base, his father freshly dead, the wound in his side feeling like it was killing him, and then having to face off against Rey— it was clumsy then, a poorly applied technique built out of instinct more than training. It feels different now, on this second attempt. He moves fast, instincts heightened, sprinting so quickly past the crew that pop their heads out of doors or walk the near empty halls that he doesn’t even have time to register their faces. Driving him on, a whip to his flank, is a faint voice that sounds strangely like himself when he was younger, but also like his mother, like Luke, like Rey, and whispers across his mind. _This is all your fault._

He gets to the medbay moments after Hux’s assassins, bursting in in time to see one of them, the female omega tech, take a blaster bolt to the throat and collapse backwards into the doorway. A brief glance into the room shows him the group he set to guarding Hux, all pulling blasters, all turning to fight the invading group, and in the centre Hux, upright and awake, burnt arm curled protectively over his side, blaster still warm in his hand and a look of cold fury on his face. 

The scent of male betas, the memory of what he took from the dead Ensign’s mind, confirmation in the minds before him, the sense of their lust and desire to hurt and humiliate even if they know they will now never get a change to, their resentment at being expected to obey this omega that does not act like they think an omega should, and then it as if he himself disappears. He becomes his body. He becomes the fight and the violence. There are moments of awareness here and there, lightsabre cutting through a beta from gullet to groin, the Force ripping another one’s head off, disappointment as the third dies before he can get a hand on him, but satisfaction to see that it’s death brought about by Hux’s blaster, the feeling of fighting back to back with someone, large, warm, movements a little stilted, the familiar scent of Phasma marred by pain, before she peels away to chase down one of the fleeing enemy omegas, then the sensation of his fingers sinking into the muscular tissue of another alpha’s throat and tearing and rending until the vital parts, oesophagus, trachea, blood vessels and cartilage and soft tissue, all come away in his grip. 

At the end it comes down to him and the other alpha, a male even taller, though not as strongly built as himself, circling each other amidst the dead bodies of the other alpha’s comrades, waiting for the right moment to strike. He could strike out with the Force but he wants that sensation again, that feeling of ripping the other alpha’s throat out, maybe this time with his teeth—

‘Oh this is getting ridiculous,’ he hears. The alpha falls, a blaster bolt to the back of his head. He looks up, looks over, and there is Hux, now leaning pale and exhausted against the edge of a medical berth, but obviously the one who shot. _He is magnificent._ A worthy Dominant Omega. 

A staggered step towards the redhead and _fear,_ he smells Hux’s scent spike at the same time as he senses it in the Force. It brings him back to himself. His General’s hand clenches on blaster, a momentary impulse crossing the omega’s mind to raise it against him, to keep him away, to keep him from hurting Hux again, before the redhead forces it down, forces the blaster down and asks, ‘What in all the worlds has been going on?’

He bites his own tongue to keep down the whine that wants to escape, plaintive, pleading, instincts desperate for some kind of positive attention from his General. He clears his throat, a deep, whoof of a sound, and replies. ‘An assassination attempt. A bomb was planted in your rooms and when that didn’t work they came to finish the job in person.’

A tiny wrinkle of a frown crosses Hux’s face. ‘Assassination?’ his General’s gaze roves over him, checking for wounds, before his state of undress seems to register with the redhead who blushes lightly, gaze flickering to the side momentarily, before the omega forces it steady. ‘You weren’t attacked?’

He shakes his head. ‘No. You were their only intended target. They wished to replace you as Dominant Omega.’ At the words he feels a flutter of confusion in Hux’s mind, uncertainty, the omega wondering if that’s what he really is, if he can ever be certain of his rank or if he’s just fooling himself in thinking he will be permitted to remain so when it has become increasingly obvious that he is widely disliked, when he knows he is particularly disliked by the new Dominant Alpha— who is always so eager to humiliate him— and that when the day comes that their new Dominant Alpha takes a mate he knows full well that no such other omega will put up with his unmated presence so high in the hierarchy. ‘I—’ he begins, desperately wanting in this moment to reassure the redhead though he has no idea of what to say, but Hux doesn’t seem to be paying him any heed and interrupts him to ask—

‘These are all the conspirators? You are sure they’re all dead?’

He looks around, counts the bodies. No. No. There are some missing, the two female betas and a female omega. Mind racing. He can’t sense any threat but— quickly he comms the bridge, barking out a demand to know if any escape pods have been launched and then fired on.

‘Four, Supreme Leader,’ the commstech replies.

‘Do we have a record of who was on them?’

‘Yessir!’ the commstech squawks. Listing off names, mated pairs in three of the pods and on the final one names and descriptions matching what he took from the omega Ensign’s mind of the three missing conspirators. 

‘And you are sure they’re dead?’

‘Yessir, pod was destroyed, no sign of life in the debris.’

‘Good,’ he replies and turns his attention back to the waiting Hux. ‘With the three from the pod and one other, an Ensign, that killed when I discovered what they had planned, that is all of them’ he says.

Hux nods, ‘Very good,’ before turning his attention to the little dark haired officer. ‘Make a recording of what happened here and ensure it’s played on the other ships. We can’t have any member of the First Order thinking they can go against our Supreme Leader— and a reminder of his physical prowess will no doubt do them good.’

‘At once Sir,’ the little omega replies, dark eyes glancing over at him for a moment. He blinks. Surprised. Looking from the little officer to the others in the group that defended Hux, even to Phasma, arguing with a droid that’s trying to prod her back onto her berth. There’s something different there. Respect, he thinks. Certainly more approval than any of them felt towards him earlier. And, deep down, a vicious satisfaction at what he did to the would-be assassins, the physical might he was willing to show, all in defence of their Dominant Omega. 

A little beep and he looks back to find Hux has a droid of his own attempting to force him back into berth. The redhead is pale, stinks of pain as well as the myriad, overlaid, nuanced scents of distress. The droid is insisting he must rest, that his ribs need fixing, that the burns need treating unless he wants them to scar. _A memory of his father’s voice taking a turn for the poetic, himself a child, the adults all in discussion of some criminal case involving a Senator’s son throwing acid in the face of his omega who was trying to leave him because of his cruelty. **”A terrible thing, to so mar an omega’s beauty.”** Luke had scoffed, he remembers that now, mechanical hand twitching as though wanting to rise to the scars on his own face._

‘Rest,’ he finds himself saying. ‘I will ensure there are no hints of further treachery amongst the rest of the fleet.’ What he really means is “I promise I will keep you safe.”

It’s doubtful Hux hears this meaning, for the omega is more focused on the ramifications of more traitors being found. ‘If you do find more I would appreciate it if you would consult me before meting out punishment,’ the redhead says, tense, expecting to be struck or attacked with the Force for doing so, ‘We must handle these things carefully during such times as these, it won’t take much to set most of the crew off. Things will be better, I believe, once the replacement pheromone scrubbers arrive.’ 

‘Of course. I value your judgement,’ he replies, leaving Hux stunned. The redhead blinks, red, red mouth opening and closing, speechless.

After a moment his General clears his throat. ‘Indeed,’ a moment’s pause and then the redhead adds ‘Keep safe, Supreme Leader.’

He nods, leaves the room, a deep, settled peace welling up from somewhere within. _Keep safe._

It’s intellectual curiosity, he tells himself, when he goes looking for omega porn.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this chapter is about porn and Kylo's relationship with porn (there will be some mention of female masturbation just fyi). I have no idea if I should apologize about that. I hope some of you find it interesting.
> 
> In other news this fic now has the most kudos (and bookmarks. AND subscriptions!) of any fic I have posted on this site! Thank you all so much! I can't even begin to express how much I appreciate you all!

By the time he returns to his rooms he is both exhausted and agitated, unsettled. He has spent the night, well into the day, patrolling his ships, probing minds and questioning people, looking for any hint of further treason. There were hints of dissatisfaction, a lot of dissatisfaction, but that dissatisfaction hasn’t bred any further plans to take out Hux— or himself. He is restless though, aggression looming just under the surface that he still has to battle back. It was his fault, he knows. What happened. _He knows._ He has to do better. Be a better Supreme Leader, a better Dominant Alpha. He is determined now. He will succeed. No matter the cost. 

He managed not to kill anyone, which he thinks is a good first start, especially since he has been forced to sense the ugly thoughts in the minds of so many of the crew about his General— and the ugly thoughts about himself. So many, too many, members of the First Order are only loyal to one of them, or worse yet think they both should be done away with, that the future is only sure in someone else’s hands. The First Order seems a thing divided, and he has no idea how to bring both sides back together. 

It’s little comfort that things did seem to improve near the end of his patrol, after the broadcast depicting the remains of the attempted assassins and detailing exactly how each met their end. He reminds himself that by the time he returned to his rooms he could feel a glow of approval from many of those he passed. He has acted like a proper Dominant Alpha in protecting the Dominant Omega(even if some of them would rather the Dominant Omega was someone else), and so some of their doubts have eased. He hadn’t really realised how many doubts there were until now. Funny how the threat to Hux seems to have brought it all into the light. It does make sense, he is forced to admit. In a healthy pack the Dominant Omega is unassailable, all will die— and gladly— to protect them. It makes sense that his treatment of Hux, Snoke’s, and the fact that Hux is undeniably the Dominant Omega, without rival, should combine to undermine pack stability— even without Snoke’s death and its consequences things couldn’t have continued on this way for too long without trouble. He really will have to try harder, both to make sure the First Order realises that Hux is indispensable, is actually recognised by him as the Dominant Omega, but also to prove himself as worthy of his own station. It’s galling. He feels quite thoroughly chastened. 

Maybe it’s because he can’t sleep that he does it. He is tired, the few hours rest before the explosion seem as if they were longer ago than the night before, but he can’t make himself calm down. Meditation would be the obvious answer, but— what if Luke comes for him when he lets down his guard?

At first he’s simply going to seek out one of the usual beta holos he prefers, maybe one of the series with that pretty brunette beta who takes a massive fake knot so very nice, but when he’s loaded up the database— Most of the porn that pops up, as it does every time, is alpha/omega. He usually ignores it, or does his best to through the disgust it makes him feel, but right now he’s curious. He tells himself it’s nothing more than being on a ship in a fleet full of omegas in heat when he has never fucked one (never fucked anyone) and the last time he actually deliberately looked at porn with omegas in it was back when his parents were visiting him at the temple. His father had taken him aside one day while his mother and Luke were talking, handed him a copy of the man’s ancient and disconcertingly well used database of porn holos, given him a rough pat on the shoulder and left him to it. 

Whatever Han had intended with the gesture it probably wasn’t the end result. It had felt at the time like a criticism, like Han had known, or guessed, some of all the things wrong with him, and by handing over the stash of porn was trying to say: “this is the kind of alpha you must be to be my son.”

He has tried so very hard. 

They’d mostly been female omegas, though there had been a few blond, always blond and blue eyed, male ones. He had avoided those particular holos, it being all too soon after that moment when he had looked at his uncle— things had been weird since then. He had felt weird. Under the hurt he had hoped so hard that his father’s collection of porn would actually have some kind of solution for how weird he’d felt. 

It was unpleasant, unarousing all of it, disgusting to watch, the alphas, big, ugly alphas, treating the omegas like they were less than human, like animals, worse than animals. And the omegas hadn’t complained, the omegas had acted like they actually were as sub-human as the alphas seemed to see them; they’d moaned and whined and dripped everywhere and wallowed in it, and they seemed to love it when they were being bitten—and not just on the nape of the neck, the mounting bite— or spat on or slapped on the ass and called a slut or a whore, and the way they begged for it had just made him think they deserved this kind of treatment. 

It was pretty vanilla stuff he’d learned after, when he was much older and had found this database with its endless popups offering oral knotting and female omegas taking it up the ass or in every orifice all at once. Though the stuff with the male omegas sometimes seems to be worse. He’d almost think the people who make it are angry at the very existence of them, want to humiliate them, hurt them, for being what they are. It’s all very enigmatic. 

For a moment he wavers, the little link labelled _female betas_ on the side calling his name, but no. He searches for _omega in heat._ A quick glance over the result tells him it’s not what he’s looking for. It’s the same as always, the same as the very first porn he saw when he was trying to be his father’s son, and he can feel his face scrunching up. Maybe it’s the alphas that’re the problem. He knows he’s never been all that interested in porn featuring female betas that also has an actual alpha in it and not just a series of toys modelled after over-sized alpha dicks. He’s never been attracted to his own sex and the sight of another alpha with a beta or an omega doesn’t so much excite an empathetic response, where he can imagine he is that alpha with that beta or omega, so much as a competitive one. _Omega in heat masturbating_ he tries. 

This looks more promising. He moves back a little, gets comfortable on his leather couch in front of his recreational holo projector. Glancing over names and thumbnails he decides on a holo starring a pretty, dark haired omega that looks a bit like Rey. She flickers into being, pale, blue light, no background in the recording, sitting up on her knees and frozen still, smiling a naughty little smile at him. He hits play. The image quality is good, probably professionally produced, with barely any stutters or lines running through her body as she moans softly, runs her hands across her breasts, leading them down between her thighs. Her slick shines there, dripping down between her knees. 

He starts to get hard. This isn’t that different to watching a beta porn. The girl is pretty but she’s not saying much, and her moans are soft and sweet and not the annoying wailing he remembers from his father’s porn. After a while of petting herself she reaches out of frame and comes back with a false-knot, a big, wobbly, realistically modelled one, and starts to rub the head of it up and down over the slit of her cunt. He reaches down, cups his dick, hard and straining. He could do it, he could get himself off, but— she’s not in heat. 

The title might say _pretty young omega in heat takes massive false-knot_ but he can tell she isn’t actually, that the title is just to entice, that it doesn’t reflect reality. He can’t really explain how he knows, it feels like some animal instinct, some alpha instinct, looking at her body language and just _knowing_. He wants to know what it’s like when they actually are in heat, wants to know what all those alphas (and betas and other omegas) are experiencing from their mates right now. So he closes the holo and goes back to browsing.

There’s a lot to choose from. There aren’t many male omegas is the first thing he notices, mainly females and some women that he could swear are betas pretending to be omegas, though he could no more explain how he can tell that than explain how he can tell if they’re in heat. Though not a lot of them are actually in heat, no matter what the title to the holo says, and he wonders why. He couldn’t even begin to guess. It occurs to him that he’s never actually asked an omega what it’s like to be them, has very little idea of how they experience their own sexuality, the fetishization of their bodies and their heat cycles.

After a few minutes of browsing he starts to wonder if it’s just all the things wrong with him or if a lot of this stuff is actually directed at betas. Maybe it’s all the variants on _Sexy bitch/slut/whore omega in heat for massive beta cock_ making him think that, but the endless parade of pretty girls and fake-knots or model beta cocks doesn’t appeal to him on any deeper level than seeing a beta in just the same position. It is arousing, he is turned on, he can’t deny it, turned on but vaguely thinking of just going back to his usual stuff, the usual set of girls that get him off, because if he has any alpha instincts to be roused by pretty omegas this isn’t doing it. He can tolerate pretty omega girls by themselves, can probably get off to it— maybe that’s all he needs to know. 

_In nest_ the words catch his eye. His attention shifts straight to the title. _Sexy omega in heat masturbating in nest._ His breath catches, it feels like his heart clunks in his chest, skipping a beat. The pretty omega in question is female, plump, and the thumbnail has her obviously naked but just as obviously snuggled up in a nest. He almost selects it, fuck his dick suddenly aches, but the thought crosses his mind— he’s never been interested in male betas, has no idea what they look like with a big false-knot shoved up inside, and if he’s going to do this and see if it works, see if he’s not a totally broken alpha after all, maybe he should push it as far from the familiar as he can. This time he searches for _male omega in heat masturbating in nest ._

Thumbnail after thumbnail of male omegas, most of them naked, all of them very obviously in a nest. His hand goes down, squeezes his dick, tries to quell it. It’s oddly exciting, he finds himself leaning forward, breaths coming deep, almost panting, trying to see the details of the little bodies curled up in the soft, plush looking nests, though at the same time he catches himself being critical, thinking about how that nest looks poorly constructed on the right side, or how that one doesn’t look like it has enough padding, or how that one doesn’t seem to have any blankets for the omega to wrap himself in if he gets cold or wants comfort. A touch of contempt. He could build a better nest— his eyes catch. A lithe, pale form, an enviably well built nest, the title like something from a weapons parts catalogue written by someone with only a poor grasp of Galactic Standard; _In nest sexy amateur homemade in heat male omega fists ass for mate stationed off world._ A flicker of memory taken from Hux’s mind, excitement— then something like guilt. He shouldn’t have mentioned it. He shouldn’t have used it to humiliate Hux. He’ll chose a different holo, he will, he— 

He selects it. 

The omega is pale, though he’d guess blond and not the redhead Hux is. The man is slender, though probably not as tall as his General. His eyes briefly roam over the nest, yes, a very well built nest, with actual old-fashioned hand woven walls (that look they might be cane?), comfortable and safe and with plenty of padding as well as blankets. The right size for the omega to stretch out in but not so big he’ll feel unsafe. He feels some part of himself relax, the omega is safe, the omega is happy, and this omega is very obviously actually in heat.

It’s something in the languor of the way the omega moves, something in the flush darkening cheeks and lips and the tips of nose and eyes and every high point on the man’s body, something in the heat of the gaze, the pleasure and desire evident in the face as the omega speaks to his mate. It doesn’t take long to work out this is not a holo produced for public consumption, it’s something tender, private, made by the omega to send their alpha while the two are separated. He has no idea how it’s escaped out into the Galaxy to be loaded by him, watched by him, consumed by him. 

It begins with the omega wrapped up in a soft and comfortable looking blanket— and isn’t that an odd, delightful tease, glimpses of pale flesh seen here and there as the blanket slips, but never the whole thing, never what’s between the omega’s legs— and updating his mate on his life and expressing his disappointment that he has gone into heat before his alpha’s scheduled leave, followed by some discussion of the things he’s done to make sure he’ll be safe; packmates invited over to guard from the other room, all doors barred, the apartment still smelling like alpha to deter rivals, scent suppressants taken— Here he feels a tinge of worry, instinctual, for this omega he doesn’t even know. Scent suppressants had failed, just like heat and rut suppressants, after he killed Snoke. They are imperfect, fallible, he pushes the thought away. It doesn’t matter. He doesn’t even know this omega so why should he care what happens to him?

It’s so very intimate, the way the omega speaks to the alpha, so intimate and loving, affectionate, as if the very thought of his mate fills the man with joy. He feels strange watching it, a voyeur imposing on this moment, but at the same time it’s so easy to fall under the holo’s sway, to imagine it’s _him_ the omega is talking to, imagine it’s his nest the omega is praising, imagines it’s him that the omega misses, imagines it’s his scent and his body heat and his strength and his comfort and his knot that the omega admits to longing for— in a way that’s somewhere between shy and mischievous.

It’s then that the omega sheds the blanket, lets the watcher see all of his pale and slender body. He’s a little soft, without quite the wiry strength of Hux, but that’s ok, that’s good. Some instinct tells him Hux looks underfed, that an alpha would have to make sure he ate more. If Hux was mated maybe he would look a little more like this, a little plumper, a little fuller in ass and thighs and upper arms. 

He’s pretty, the omega. His whole body is pretty. Face and form and pretty little cock, pretty little hole teasing from between the swell of his ass. Wet. Dripping. Slick oozing out and staining the nest beneath. He huffs in a breath, sucks in air like he’s trying to scent it. Would it smell like’s Hux’s slick, like water-blossoms, but sweet, without the edge of distress that Hux always carries with him? _What is he doing? Why is he thinking about Hux?_ The thought of Hux brings guilt. He ignores it. 

It’s fingers first. The omega slips one inside, another, all the time looking into the lens of the holo recorder, all the time spilling out a low murmur of praise and affection for his missing mate. The microphone just catches the sound of slick, of fingers squelching within, and it makes him shudder. It’s reflexive, hand burrowing into his pants, drawing out his cock. The cold air of his quarters makes him flinch, makes him fuck forward into nothing for a moment. 

Another finger, another coo, whispers of how much the omega misses his mate, how good his mate is to him, how good the nest is, how good his mate’s knot makes him feel. Another, four inside now, only the thumb to go. He knows what’s next, remembers it from Hux’s mind. He leans forward, both hands between his legs, one on his dick, the other clenched over his knot, pulsing it, teasing it—

The omega shifts to make sure the recording captures both his face and what’s between his legs and then that thumb, tucked in, pushed in, a soft inhale of delight, omega eyes fluttering, the muscles of his hole twitching, then clench. He can see the moment the omega makes a fist, pushes it the rest of the way.

Fuck. His own hand clenches down hard on his knot. Vision whites. He comes, arching forward so violently he almost brains himself on his holo projector, only catching himself when he lets go of his dick and slams that hand down onto the surface of the thing, right through the pretty little omega whining, _“Yes, yes, yes, love you, I love you, yes, knot me knot me knot me knot me, please, oh fuck, please, knot me.”_ His other hand stays wrapped around his own knot, squeezing it through the aftershocks, through the time he’d be tied to a mate, eyes glassy, gaze blearily focussed on the omega, moaning and shuddering through the prolonged orgasm being knotted— even if that knot is in reality a fist— induces. 

‘Fuck,’ he gasps out when his brain comes back online. That was intense. He unclenches his cramping hand from his knot and lets himself collapse backwards, sliding the rest of the way off the couch until he sits splay legged on the floor, head resting on the couch cushions. A sleepy glance is enough to tell him he’s managed to spray come all down his pants, all over his holo projector, and across part of the floor. It’s fucking humiliating in some ways, being an alpha.

The holo is over, reset to the beginning, just waiting for the watcher to play it again. For a moment he looks at the still of the omega, wrapped up in his blanket, looking into the recorder lens with a face full of love— he shuts the thing. The database pops up, and as he’s going to shut that he pauses, frowning at the ads that have replaced the old ones he’s used to. Instead of links to sites where he can watch beta women and omegas taking big alpha knots or waiting to talk to him so they can arrange to take _his_ big alpha knot the links say things like: _“Nine out of ten omegas agree this is the galaxy’s softest nesting material!”_ and _“Your omega will go wild for this alpha pheromone nest spray!”_ and _“Feel inadequate? Our simple, easy to put together, premade nest frames will take the guess work out of nest building. We guarantee your omega won’t be able to tell the difference.”_

Too fucked out to even begin to contemplate what it all means he shuts down the database and drags himself to his feet, struggling out of his robes and staggering over to his berth to collapse face down, the mess left behind for the droids to clean up in the morning. Fuck he’s tired. Though he has learnt something about himself. How exactly he’s going to reconcile the capacity to feel desire for male omegas in heat with his own notion of his beta female focussed sexuality he doesn’t know, but that’s a problem for another day.

He dreams of soft words and cooing praise, and wakes cuddling his pillow as if he was curled around a mate, protecting them from all attacks.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not sure about this chapter, but I've been pondering over it and re-reading it and at this point I feel like it would just be better to post it. Sigh.
> 
> Happy Valentines-ish day if that's your thing! Thank you all for reading, leaving kudos, and such lovely comments. I hope you are all having a great week.

The first thing he does is go to visit Hux in the medbay with some notion of making amends for his own bad behaviour, guilt lingering at the edges of his mind, though he’s choosing not to examine it too closely —he has acknowledges that he’s been disrespectful to Hux and that disrespect helped instigate the attempt on the redhead’s life, but thinking about it too much just before he sees the omega is hardly going to help him handle their interactions— only to be told by one of the impatient droids that the omega has discharged himself already. ‘He’s on the bridge,’ a voice adds, and he looks over to see Phasma sitting up and watching him with something like wry amusement from her medical berth. She’ll be in the medbay for some time yet as the droids do their best to repair the extensive damage she took in their last battle with the Resistance. A brush across the surface of her mind feels like a reprimand. She thinks him a child always throwing tantrums, but still she’s pleased by what he did to protect Hux.  
‘I see,’ he replies and turns to go. 

She snorts out a quiet laugh, and he reads from her that there are so many things she’d like to say to him, so much advice and criticism, her mind and her worries all on Hux, but how she can’t trust him to keep control of himself if she did speak up. It’s not a flattering picture of the alpha he appears in her eyes. She is important to Hux, a high ranking omega in her own right. He probably shouldn’t punish her for the way she thinks of him. 

Perhaps, no, not perhaps, he _should_ try to rely less on the Force to read people’s intentions unless it’s a matter of treason, of danger, of life and death for himself and his pack. He is reminded, as he is every time he’s become too dependent on it in the past, that what he learns above all things, above anything remotely useful, is how badly others have always thought of him.

He doesn’t know how to productively deal with what he has seen in her mind right now so he doesn’t pursue it, doesn’t say anything at all, just walks out past the baleful gaze of Lieutenant Dederis Kanron-Viellio, still recovering in the berth he’s been strapped down to in case he gets any more ideas of treason. He can’t have his desire to show the man mercy ruined by the man’s desire to get himself killed. There’s a stink of shame to the defeated alpha, but hopefully that will pass in time. 

He steps into a new awkwardness on the bridge. Hux is Hux, all attention on whatever report some beta commstech is giving, but around him— The omegas who lurked at the edges and observed the redhead with enmity are either gone or forcing their countenances to display more neutrality, the same with hostile betas, and while the usual mass of Hux’s hangers-on of all genders are still here, the mass of defensive and covetous alphas seems to have been joined by another group now lurking nearby. Alphas mainly, though he spots a beta or two amongst their number. Their body language is less protective of Hux and more— he can’t quite parse it. Calm? Watchful? Contemplative? They are signalling attraction, but not in a way that makes them seem desperate for his General’s notice, and as he walks in their attention turns to him without showing anything resembling hostility. 

He doesn’t even need to use the Force to detect the approval they feel towards him, the air hangs heavy with the scent of alphas comfortable in their pack. It’s strange. He guesses it links back to the attack on Hux and his own actions, but at the same time he’s not quite sure he understands all the nuances of what’s happening. Temptation strikes, he could just read it in their minds— but, no. Didn’t he just promise himself to try not to do that? 

They watch him as he walks towards Hux. He does his best to keep all his attention on his General, and not the masses that feel as if they’re judging him. At his approach Hux looks up and his eyes are briefly caught on the bacta gel smeared thickly on the still red, but healing, burns to Hux’s face and bare hand.  
Anticipation, he’s sure he can sense it, smell it in the air. He feels oddly self-conscious, strangely embarrassed, more than a little like an idiot. ‘You are well?’ he asks.

‘Well enough to resume my duties if that’s what you mean,’ the redhead replies, face impassive— he can’t stand this, it’s all too hard. Just until this situation is resolved, until he is no longer in rut, just so he can read Hux, just so he can know if this sudden sense of rejection he feels is based on anything more than the paranoia of his own biology— He reaches out, feels Hux’s suspicion. The redhead is apprehensive that this encounter will end like the last one they had on the bridge, him publicly humiliating the omega if Hux dares to speak out. He feels a spike of shame lance through him, tries to ignore it.

For a moment an apology lingers on his lips, but in the end he can’t bring himself to speak the words, especially not here, not in front of so very many watchers. And they are watching, watching so very eagerly. 

Resolution already broken it’s nothing to reach out and brush across the surface of their minds, to try and work out what this is all about. They’re waiting to see if he intends to court Hux, if his defence of the General was the first step in an attempt to woo the omega. His next breath catches in his throat, almost chokes him. No. Absolutely not. Just because he’s learnt he can get himself off to the sight of an omega with their own fist up their ass does not mean he wants one as a mate, let alone Hux— he flickers a glance at the man, all those high points of his body just as flushed as the omega in the porn, the water blossom smell of slick still sweet around him, the pop and crackle of his presence in the Force. Lush, fertile, ripe. He looks away. Fuck. No. No. 

‘Are you quite alright?’ the man in question’s voice comes and he looks up to see Hux looking at him and he knows from the heat of his face he’s gone red himself and he realises that everyone must have heard him choking on air and— more shame. 

‘Yes!’ he snaps, and then at the flinch back and sense of Hux telling himself he should know better than to even bother he tries again. ‘I’m fine. Is— is your face sore?’ Fuck. Great. Back to the topic of Hux’s health and this time sounding like a child. He feels even stupider.

‘Um,’ Hux mumbles, momentarily caught off guard, a little flinch of movement telegraphing the desire to lift a hand to the burns that will hopefully soon dissolve to nothing beneath the bacta. ‘Er— It’s, It’s healing well, Supreme Leader.’ A little pause in which he has no idea what to say and is thinking fondly of just turning around and leaving and then Hux says ‘I feel that we should discuss what happened with the traitors, though perhaps in a less public setting?’

He agrees and then trails after Hux as the redhead leads him past all the eager watchers and off to the same private conference room that Hux always prefers to discuss such matters in. He doesn’t understand why, but it’s not quite what he expected. In truth when Hux suggested they move somewhere more private a part of him had thrilled at the idea that private might also mean _intimate._ Not that he wants to be intimate with Hux, or any omega, experiments in porn consumption are just that, _experiments,_ anyway, he reminds himself, Hux’s rooms have been badly damaged, most of Hux’s possessions destroyed. 

On that note ‘Where are you staying?’ he asks as the redhead is carefully lowering himself into one of the black and chrome conference chairs. As the omega startles and flails a little he notices something— ‘What happened to your coat? Actually, never mind, you were wearing it when you were caught in the explosion so it must be being laundered and repaired. Back to the issue at hand. Your rooms have been destroyed so where are you staying?’ This may actually be the most awkward he’s felt since he was still at the temple, outdoing even some of the moments he had with Rey. 

‘Um,’ Hux almost stutters. ‘Oh, yes. The coat is with the laundry droids, I am also somewhat lucky that this uniform and my old boots were being repaired when the explosion happened— not that you asked about them. Ah, yes, as to my rooms— I don’t know. I suppose I shall have to requisition some.’

‘I will take care of it,’ he tells the omega on impulse, thinking that way he can make sure they’re safe, secure, and perhaps post some guards— not betas, a flicker of memory— absolutely not betas. Maybe omegas, or perhaps loyal— and he will make absolutely sure they’re _loyal_ — alphas like Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio, attracted to their own kind so they’ll be less likely to be distracted by murderous omegas. Or to want to knot Hux. That is an important point. Maybe he should assign Hux a personal guard. Yes. Yes. An excellent idea. 

‘I am quite capable of doing so myself,’ Hux snaps, scent and sense and presence in the Force becoming prickly, edging into offence. His General’s mind is cycling through notions of being thought helpless, stupid, infantile, all the ways alphas think of omegas. 

It is doubtful that there’s a politic way to handle this, and if there is it’s beyond him, he has never been good at navigating interpersonal relationships, so he simply says, perhaps not says, perhaps something more like _orders,_ but orders with Hux’s best interests at heart. ‘Do not protest.’ His General opens his mouth to do just that, but he interrupts with, ‘It will reassure me after what happened.’

Hux mulls this over for a moment in a state of quiet disbelief before agreeing reluctantly, somewhat resentfully, and turning his attention to the details of what actually did happen. The questions the redhead asks are concise, to the point, and he does his best to answer them without letting slip some of the finer points. He doesn’t like the thought of letting Hux know what the enemy omegas, betas, had planned for him. His General would find it distressing, he would have to find it distressing, even recollecting it makes _him_ feel distressed. Do omegas really plot against each other like that? Take pleasure in the idea of others of their kind being debased like that? They are not questions he can answer, but thinking about it too long sours his mixed feelings about the pretty omega he got himself off to the day before. Could that sweet seeming man think like that? Does Hux?

No. He’s pretty sure Hux would never— he’s never caught any hint of it from the redhead’s mind and his General’s distress when tracking down the rapists during the first wave of heat and rut had seemed genuine. Had been genuine. Everything from scent, to presence in the Force, to the feel of his mind had confirmed Hux’s abhorrence at the crimes committed. 

For a moment he has a terrible sympathy for the redhead as well as a burst of anger towards himself. On reflection it seems selfish, cruel, to leave his General to deal with prosecuting such terrible things without backup and support, without even his own involvement. 

‘How are you coping?’ he finds himself asking, meaning both with everything that’s happened, but also with being in heat and being attacked and having to deal with the stink of everyone and all their expectations. 

‘If this is to be the beginning of some new round of criticisms—’ Hux begins, before he quickly interrupts the omega—

‘No, no, that’s not—’ how to put it? He doesn’t think Hux will welcome questions about how he’s coping after being attacked and almost assassinated, the prickly cast to mind and scent make it pretty clear that the redhead will just take anything he says there as a criticism— a memory of Luke trying to talk to him about conflict resolution at the temple, when he’d been fighting with most of the other students because they refused to understand what he actually meant. _”I know it’s hard kiddo, but sometimes you have to give them something, show a little weakness so they don’t think you’re just trying to make them feel like you’re so much stronger than them all the time.”_ At the time he’d snapped at his uncle that he was stronger than them so why should he have to pretend otherwise, but right now maybe he should try and take the man’s suggestion. _Why has he been thinking so much about Luke lately? And so often without the pain and fear the very thought of his uncle once provoked?_

__He clears his throat. ‘I just mean— how are you coping so well with being in heat? Because I have found being in rut hard, at times, a lot of the time, but I have the Force to give me strength and keep my mind clear. I just, I wondered how anyone could be managing so well without it?’_ _

__‘The Force,’ Hux repeats, something a touch of amusement to his voice. He’s not sure what to make of it, but there’s no mockery in Hux’s mind, just a faint musing on the nature of the Force and how something that seems so irredeemably violent could be of any benevolent use. After a moment the redhead speaks again, slowly, cautiously, as though expecting to be shut down at any moment. ‘You know repeated studies have shown that, with the exception of a few very specific circumstances, neither alphas in rut nor omegas in heat are anywhere near as mindless as they are generally believed to be—’_ _

__‘Really?’ he finds himself asking before the sentence is quite finished, accidentally speaking over the last two words. ‘That can’t be right, just look how everyone on the fleet has acted since this all began.’_ _

__‘Well it is something of a rare case,’ Hux says a touch ruefully. ‘It is not common that an entire pack will go into season at once, and when it happens, as in this case, it is usually as a result of—’ the redhead seems to catch himself, before continuing on, as unemotively as he can —‘the death of the old Dominant Alpha after an— an _unexpected_ — challenge. The uncertainty such an event brings can have drastic ramifications for the surviving pack members, as far as a sense of security and their place in the hierarchy is concerned, but we’ve already discussed that when it first happened. And, of course, it creates a feedback loop when everyone does go into season at once— pheromones are usually blamed for it, though there is some suggestion that it is in part a product of empathy and a tendency for pack members to mirror behaviour— whatever the cause, aside from inducing everyone to go into season at the same time, it can intensify and prolong the issue beyond a normal heat or rut cycle— but even then it still it does not make us stupid, it does not make us mindless. In honesty you and—’ Hux hesitates, ‘— and I, being as highly ranked as we are— and in a situation where we could be under attack at any moment— we are not getting the brunt of it; our instincts to lead and protect the pack overwhelming some of our baser drives. But even those that seem to have fallen fully under its sway are still capable of rational thought, and if we actually were under attack and the pack needed them to fight or to flee they would be quite capable of doing so—’ Hux trails off, flinches, seems to pull himself into himself for a moment. ‘Sorry, I did not mean to go on like that. I am sure you do not find it at all interesting.’_ _

__He shakes his head. ‘No, I do. You speak almost as if we have a choice whether we follow our instincts—’_ _

__The redhead looks away for a moment, pensive, gathering his thoughts. His mind is working so rapidly it’s hard to follow any one train of thought for long. ‘In a way that’s what I’m saying,’ Hux says, very carefully. ‘—But in other ways it is not. It’s all very complicated. Being in season, be it heat or rut, is a very uncomfortable business, and while we are capable of thought our instincts, our emotions, our impulses— they are all heightened. I think it is easier a lot of the time to just give in to it, especially if you are not high enough in the pecking order that you have conflicting instincts telling you to worry about the safety of everyone else and the ramifications of doing so. Also, of course, if you’ve grown up believing that you don’t have a choice, that being in season makes you a slave to your baser instincts—’_ _

__He frowns, not sure of what to make of what Hux is saying. ‘Why not just order everyone to stay at their station and not— fight, fuck, try to betray us, or crawl off somewhere with their mates and all but cripple the fleet?’_ _

__‘Because it would be unnecessarily cruel, for one,’ Hux replies after a long moment. ‘Those with mates, or in the process of courting before this struck, would find it agonizing to be away from them at this time, and it would damage morale, pack cohesiveness, and those relationships— bad enough for those with mates stationed planetside somewhere or civilians— especially as we cannot risk outside communications giving away our position— or for those with mates who have died— but, from a more pragmatic perspective, with so many of us in season and it all feeding on itself, violence and death are an inevitable consequence of even the slightest loss of control, perhaps the death of a significant portion of our remaining crew if everything gets utterly out of hand. And it’s likely to get out of hand. No matter how highly I would like to think of the crew they are still fallible, emotional, frightened and uncertain. It is better if as many of them as possible form pairs— or groups— and keep themselves distracted until it is all over. We need no more treason or attempts at assassination on our hands—’ the redhead suddenly seems to remember who he is talking to, the contemplative tone shifting, becoming more cold and impersonal. ‘At least that’s what I think, based on my own experiences and my research.’_ _

__He feels a tinge of disappointment at the distance that suddenly seems to yawn between them once more. It is puzzling though, he has never heard his mother or father or Luke talk of studies or the rationality of those in heart or rut. ‘You have done a lot of research?’_ _

__A sharp spike in Hux’s scent. Distress. A flurry of images across the surface of his mind, pain and fear and anger, before the redhead bites them back. The impulse is there to chase them down, to probe Hux’s mind, to understand the redhead in his entirety and leave the omega with no secrets, no privacy, not even the sanctity of his innermost thoughts, just invade until he is all laid bare, but he resists. It feels like it would be disrespectful, and he must do better at respecting Hux. It’s difficult though. So difficult. Eventually Hux speaks, tone carefully measured. ‘My father was a beta. I wished to better— _understand_ my own nature.’_ _

__‘What about your mother?’ he asks before he can stop himself._ _

__The hurt spikes sharper. ‘My mother—’ Hux’s voice comes out weak, before the redhead clears his throat and asserts ‘my mother was no one. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I should return to the bridge.’_ _

__‘Of course,’ he replies, but Hux isn’t listening. The man is composing himself, getting to his feet, turning and leaving. He watches the redhead go and can’t even begin to untangle the mess of his own thoughts, his own feelings._ _

__It’s only later, as he begins his search for new rooms for Hux, that he realises the possible ramifications of offering to do so. They’re rooms, he reminds himself, it is not as if he is building Hux a nest._ _


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just posting this quickly. Thank you so much for your comments and kudos, and for even reading it in the first place. Hope you all are having/have had a lovely weekend!

Hux will have to sleep this night. Hux can’t sleep this night somewhere unsafe. In order for Hux to be safe he needs somewhere private, protected, to sleep. In other words Hux needs new rooms. He does. New rooms must be chosen— it’s just that none of them are good enough. They’re too small or they’re too close to the hull so they might be damaged in an attack or they’re too far inside the ship and not private enough or they’re ugly or they smell weird— or they smell like someone else. Another omega, a beta, a _male_ beta, or an alpha. 

It’s just Hux. They’re just rooms. Maybe he should get someone else to choose them, maybe that little dark haired officer— no. No. NO. 

He’s driving himself insane. He’s been over half the ship examining empty officer’s quarters and all it’s doing is winding him up. Hux needs rooms he reminds himself. Hux will have to sleep at some point— perhaps not soon because Hux is ever the workaholic, but surely at some point in the next twelve standard hours the redhead will have to rest.

Maybe he could put another berth in his own quarters, that way he could be sure Hux was safe— what? No. What in all the hells is wrong with him? He’s losing it. He is. It was that stupid fucking assassination attempt, it’s got his wires all crossed, convinced the animal, alpha part of him that Hux is somehow vital to everything. There is no reason this should be. Hux hasn’t spontaneously metamorphosed into something more useful. He’s still the same incompetent omega as always— he remembers Hux injured, blaster in hand, enemies falling at his feet. Maybe not so useless— Now he feels guilty. Oh for the love of— It’s rut. It has to be. Once his rut is over he’ll regain his senses. 

So— he just has to deal with things until then and dealing with things means finding rooms for Hux. He’s looked at all the empty officer’s rooms though, and techs and soldiers sleep in dormitories, so it’s not exactly like he can house Hux in one of those No. He just needs to go over all the officer’s quarters again, to try harder to find them less objectionable. 

They are objectionable though. Perhaps not for some other unimportant little omega officer, but for Hux— He backtracks, returning to the last one he examined and does his very best to look at the thing from a perfectly rational, objective perspective. It’s reasonably sized, a berthroom, a bathroom, a main room encompassing cooking facilities, relaxation facilities, and study facilities. It’s clean. It’s in good repair. It’s unoccupied— but, at some point in the past someone has been inside this room. He can smell them, the faintest after traces of stale Alpha pheromones. He thinks of all the ways such traces could have been left behind on a ship with working pheromone scrubbers and a crew taking working scent suppressants in a room which has never been formally occupied and all he can think is some worthless knot-for-brains of an alpha has snuck in here at some point to take a shit or jerk off. He bites back the growl that rises in his throat at the idea. So, no, this one is unacceptable. 

He tries the next one— again the problem is scent, it was occupied until its previous occupant died during their last battle with the Resistance. A beta. A female beta, but still, traces of her scent seem to be all over everything and he can see signs of occupation, like the almost unnoticeable handprint from her repeatedly steadying herself against the wall on her early morning trip to the bathroom, or the slight stain on the surface of the berth that suggests she slept face down without a pillow and drooled onto the gel mattress in almost the same spot every night.

The next set of rooms he explores are too small, fit barely for an Ensign, tiny bathroom all there is aside from the one room for sleeping, eating, and studying. Inadequate for an omega of Hux’s station. 

The ones after that come off a main arterial hallway and would be too hard to guard, foot traffic constantly traipsing up and down, not just the officers whose rooms are neighbours, but Stromtroopers on their way to the mess hall or training rooms from their dormitory nearby— maybe that’s what he should do. Not so much give up for now but retreat to his own special training rooms and see if pulverising some training droids helps to clear his mind. 

He remembers channelling the Force into his body, using it to move faster, be stronger— it’s something he should practise. As he heads to his training rooms he wishes for a moment that he had another Force user to spar with. His knights would be impossible, it’s been so long since he heard from any of them that he knows their pack bond must be weakening, dissolving by now, and the thought of adding other alphas and omegas powerful in the Force to this mess— no. No— then his mind goes to _Rey._ Why did she reject him? If only she hadn’t rejected him. He imagines what this would be like, trapped on this ship in this fleet, in rut, with her in his nest— he reaches down, readjusts his pants over his stiffening dick. No. She’s a beta, she wouldn’t understand. Anyway, he’s not sure she’d actually be able to physically cope with his rut, wouldn’t she start to chafe, to bruise, to tear after a while? For a moment the fact that her body is not designed to take an alpha, to be knotted again and again, for half hour stretches at a time, feels less like an enticing tease and more like a problem. He knows there are alpha/beta couples tucked away in nests at this moment while the alpha is in rut, perhaps he should ask one of them how they cope? He cringes. That would be— embarrassing, to say the least.

After stretching and warming up he sets the training droids to attack all at once, a mindless hoard. He isn’t in the mood to fight a tricky opponent, one that worries about tactics and tries to plan ahead. What he wants is an all-out brawl, alpha against alphas, something without the stakes of his last fight, without Hux’s safety to distract him, just a chance for pure physical violence. 

As he fights he draws on the Force and lets it suffuse his flesh, not using it to predict his enemies actions, not using it to defend himself, not using it as a method of attack, just to strengthen his body and improve his speed. As he dodges blows and strikes back, feels mechanical parts crush beneath his fists, it is almost like the fighting burns his mind clean. His focus narrows, distraction fades, he becomes the fight. There is a serenity to violence that he could never properly explain to his mother, his father, his uncle. 

When it’s done, himself victorious, three droids destroyed and seven more damaged to greater or lesser degrees, he stands in the wreckage and realises he’s no closer to working out what to do about Hux. Hux still needs rooms. 

Soaked with sweat, more than a little sick of himself, he stomps back to his quarters through mostly empty corridors— aside from wandering betas and unmated alphas and omegas, all of which wrinkle their noses and shift out of his way. He must stink. That’s the cliché of alphas in rut; sweating, stinking, oversexed, violent, mindless. Is Hux right? Are they really less mindless than everyone thinks? Is it really a choice to give in to it? But that’s not really what Hux implied, was it? Hux said it was all complicated. He would have to agree. A fucking complicated business, being an alpha. 

It’s when he’s in his luxuriously warm water-shower that the idea comes to him. There are rooms, good rooms, that have never been used and should be well defensible, rooms that he himself has passed on his way from his training rooms to his quarters. They are the ship’s guest quarters, not the relatively small and uncomfortable set put aside for visiting techs or people low in the First Order’s hierarchy, but the well-appointed and luxurious ones designed for honoured guests. Snoke himself, if the old bastard had ever deigned to spend any time on this ship. He’s never been inside them himself, but they should be nice, comfortable, appropriate.

When he’s dressed he goes to investigate them, which isn’t a long journey as the very best of the best rooms is only down the hall from his own. He’d be nearby, on hand if Hux was once more attacked, and if he kept his senses vigilant it’s unlikely that anyone could even sneak past him in the first place to try to do the redhead harm. It seems vitally important that no one tries to harm Hux again. 

Even the doors are fancier, large and imposing and a reminder of the power of any potential resident within. They open almost silently, his rank as Supreme Leader giving him access to everywhere on the ship. There is no scent of other here, no sign of life, no evidence that anyone other than a routine maintenance droid has entered this space since the ship was built. The rooms are big, bigger even than those of his own quarters, and there four of them instead of the usual three. Berthroom, bathroom, living quarters and a separate study. Hux would like a study. The walls and floors are dark, shiny black plasteel veined in gold in mockery of polished stone, though to his surprise the floor of the berthroom is laid with the most amazingly soft black carpet, which actually smells faintly like the real wool of some ovine mammal. The whole place speaks of conspicuous consumption, of a reminder of the material wealth of the First Order, to confirm the importance of those staying there high up the pecking order or intimidate those further down. As he walks around, eyes catching on unnecessary decoration and the excess of furniture he begins to suspect that this place is to Snoke’s design and not Hux’s; he’s been inside Hux’s rooms now, even damaged as they were enough remained that he knows the almost austere way the man choses to live. 

Whether Hux would appreciate the décor, the expensive furniture, the kitchen as big as any one in any place his parents lived in when he was a child, seems less important than the fact that the rooms are safe. This set, the very best, were the ones that Snoke would have stayed in and their design reflects that. The door is very thick, capable of actually being barred, and he can sense no backdoors, no sneaky little passages, no areas of weak security easily breached to let assassins in. 

They are also very comfortable, the padding on the excess of couches and chairs plush, covered in soft black fabric— and then there’s the berth. His eyes catch on it in the berthroom, two, possibly even three times as wide as his own, almost nestlike in its construction. Slightly ovoid in shape, with raised, padded sides— the sort of berth he has slept in before as a child, when his parents had brought him with them on some of his mother’s political trips, and they’d ended up staying at incredibly fancy hotels on someone else’s dime. Attempts to intimidate her, his mother had always grumbled. His father had waved it off and laid out on their own berth, like this one, and winked at her, patted the padding, before shooing him back to his own room— he blinks away the memory.

The rich— alpha, omega, and beta alike— like to sleep in make-believe nests, the reason for which his parents could never adequately explain to him when he was younger. The notion of “perceived status” hadn’t really made sense when he was a child, but he sort of gets it now. They like to imitate alphas, because alphas are traditionally seen as higher in the hierarchy, so they sleep in beds like alpha nests. It must be odd for omegas is all he can think. Do rich alphas actually build nests, or do they just drag their mates off to their normal bed every time they go into season? If that’s the case those poor omegas can hardly feel very special, important, _precious._

He finds himself running a hand across the padding of the nestlike bed, testing it for comfort. Seems nice enough. Maybe he should lie down on it, just to make sure— no. No. He pulls his hand away and shakes off the impulse, imagining leading Hux in here to this room with this bed already stinking of his own alpha pheromones. No. Hux would misunderstand his intentions. The whole ship would hear about it and misunderstand his intentions. Eventually the entire First Order would also hear about it— absolutely not.

He breathes deep. Unnecessary embarrassment bringing a flush to his cheeks. A glance back at the berth—

Even without looking at the other sets of rooms he realises he’s made up his mind. These ones. Hux will look good here, a pretty pearl and copper bauble amongst all this expensive show of wealth. 

His hand goes once more to the edge of the nest. The **_berth._**

_An image crossed his mind, Hux in place of the omega from the porn, lying back here, legs spread, cooing and praising and pleading to be knotted._ His hand clenches down hard, feeling the expensive gel padding absorb the pressure, cushion his grip. He forces himself to let go.

What in all the hells is wrong with him?


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I decided to include Millicent- because the idea of Kylo having to navigate the idea of Hux having a cat, and a cat that does not like him, was oddly amusing to me. Thank you all so much for reading, and the comments and kudos! The reception this fic has gotten is amazing, mind-boggling really.

He feels rattled as he heads to the medbay to deal with Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio, but he can’t let himself lose control, so he draws deep on the Force, not even sure what side he’s drawing on, just grabbing at it randomly to try and force his mind into some form of compliance. 

Hux needs a personal guard, and the Lieutenant is loyal and not attracted to Hux and seems the kind of fighter who will improve with some proper training. His kind of training. Of course Hux needs a personal guard comprising more than just one alpha, but one alpha is a start. _Why does Hux need a personal guard?_ because if Hux doesn’t have a personal guard he’ll have to guard the man himself to make sure nothing happens to him. _Why?_ Fuck why. Rut is driving him mad. He draws deeper on the Force. 

The Lieutenant looks up at him with resentful disbelief when he returns to the medbay and approaches the man’s berth. Out of the corner of his eye he sees Phasma sit up and look over— he turns his full attention to her when the small, gingery thing on her lap gets up at her movement and stalks, offended, to the end of the berth before curling up there. Is that a cat? That’s a cat. Why is there a cat in the medbay?

‘Oh, don’t be like that Millie,’ Phasma coos, actually _coos,_ ‘Yes I know. I’m a great big meanie for moving. Why don’t you come back up here, I’ll give you scratchies—’ here she wiggles the metallic fingers of her new prosthetic arm, trying to entice the cat that is stubbornly ignoring her. 

‘Is there any particular reason you are standing beside my berth?’ Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio asks, and then a moment later, full of bad grace but unable to stop himself from following protocol, adds ‘Supreme Leader.’

Attention at least half on Phasma’s attempts to seduce the cat back onto her lap he asks, ‘If I assign you to Hux’s personal guard will you stop trying to kill me?’

A pause. ‘I’m sorry?’ the man bleats. ‘What did you just say?’

‘Recent events have made it clear that Hux needs guards, guards that aren’t going to spend their time trying to knot him,’ which is why most of those he found guarding Hux after the attack are out of the question. He turns his full attention to the Lieutenant for a moment. ‘From what I took from your mind that won’t be a problem.’ Out of the corner of his eye he sees Phasma finally succeed in luring the cat back up the berth by playing some game with it that has it pouncing on her new prosthetic hand and trying to violently kill it, much to the Captain’s amusement.

The other alpha flushes, bristles, released the stink of offense. He feels himself begin to puff up and bites off a growl. He must remain calm. The other alpha is strapped down, the other alpha has been defeated, the mildest scent of displeasure from another alpha does not equate to a challenge. These things are hard to remember in rut, even with the Force to draw on. ‘It’s no crime!’ the man insists, though his mind feels thick with guilt. 

‘Of course not, why would it be a crime?’ he replies, irritation rising at the man’s refusal to pay attention to what he’s actually saying. Why are people always like this? ‘Stop distracting me from the issue at hand. I’m offering you a chance to guard your precious Hux from further attack, are you interested?’

The Lieutenant observes him with suspicion for a moment. ‘Why?’

He feels his temper fray. Maybe he shouldn’t have shown mercy to this man who is so obviously either stupid or incapable of showing him his due deference. The force. The Force. He must draw on the Force. He must find peace within the Force. 

‘Stop being an idiot,’ Phasma’s calm voice interrupts his internal battle over whether or not to simply kill the other alpha and be done with it. ‘Unless you are trying to say your foolish alpha pride is more important than the General’s safety?’

‘Of course not,’ the alpha snaps. ‘I just—’ the man looks up at him and even without brushing against the other alpha’s mind he can feel how little the man is willing to trust him. 

‘ _Alphas_ ,’ Phasma scoffs, too loudly to even pretend she didn’t intend them to hear. ‘Your opinion of the Supreme Leader is immaterial. Stop carrying on and do your duty.’

For a moment the Lieutenant looks terribly upset, and a brush across his mind shows a great deal of shame at disappointing Phasma, an omega, and a high ranking and respectable one, before finally the alpha gets a hold of himself. He can feel the reluctance, the knowledge in the other alpha’s mind that once the man concedes and promises to stop challenging him and focus his attentions on guarding Hux then his honour will not let him go back on his word, and the alpha doesn’t want to stop challenging him, the alpha still very much wants to kill him— but _Hux. The Dominant Omega and all he is, and all he stands for—_

‘So be it,’ the alpha bites out, ‘I accept your offer, though with some conditions. I will no longer challenge you as long as I believe that you mean General Hux no harm. If I am given reason to doubt this then I cannot, on my honour, stand idly by when acting against you could protect him.’

Annoyance. Anger. This is more than he should have to bear. Is this what being a better Dominant Alpha means? Perhaps he should not have— no. No. It is better with Snoke dead. He does not regret his change in status, only its burdens. ‘I am not going to hurt him—’ he all but hisses, offense creeping out even though he tries to bite it back ‘but I concede if those are your terms.’

‘Very good,’ the Lieutenant snaps, the urge to do exactly what he has sworn not to do sitting heavy in his mind, in his scent, in his very presence in the Force. He can see the other alpha struggling with his own impulses. It almost makes him feel better about his failings in that area.

Once the Lieutenant calms down there is a moment of awkwardness. He didn’t think beyond this point, he has no plans for what to do next, but it’s Phasma that breaks it. ‘If I may ask; is Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio going to be the only member of General Hux’s personal guard?’

‘No!’ he snaps. ‘No, of course not—’ he just has no one else in mind so far. Too many of those he knows to be loyal to Hux also desire his General, and he can’t have that, can’t risk that. He looks at the alpha still strapped to the berth. ‘Do you know of any other alphas like you that are loyal to Hux? You know, ones that are not interested in omegas.’

He could swear he hears Phasma mutter “Oh for the—" just before the Lieutenant answers, bright red and burning with embarrassment. ‘I would appreciate it if you stopped bringing that up!’ A glance over at Phasma, watching them both with amusement as she scratches behind the cat’s ears. ‘It’s not appropriate conversation in front of an omega.’

She snorts out a laugh, says ‘Just pretend I’m not here. Actually, forget I said that. _I_ have some suggestions for viable candidates for the General’s personal guard, if you’d care to hear them?’

‘Of course,’ he replies, informing the Lieutenant that once he’s released from the medbay they will have to arrange a training programme to improve his skills, and then ignoring the man’s splutterings as he heads over to Phasma’s berth. She watches him walk with one blue eye and one silver, the colour just slightly off, mechanical, probably built by Hux the same as her arm and her new legs. The fire really did a number on her, her armour malfunctioning, overheating, burning to her skin. Any beauty the blond omega had is gone now. She looks— actually. He imagines she looks like his Grandfather. Like Vader cockled from his shell. It’s kind of eerie. 

As he approaches the cat looks up at him, body language hostile. He was not aware that she had a pet, or that pets were even allowed on the ship. ‘Does Hux know about the cat?’ he asks.

She snorts out a laugh. ‘He should, she’s his cat.’

‘What?’ he frowns down at the little thing that seems to be glaring back up at him.

‘Her name is Millicent,’ Phasma informs him and then actually turns to the cat to say ‘Millicent, this is the Supreme Leader.’

The cat does not respond to this bit of information. He doesn’t know what to say. Somehow the images of Hux and cat are not meshing in his mind. The thing is small, and cute, and clean, and plump, and obviously spoiled— For a moment he imagines Hux curled up in his rooms with the cat in his lap, petting it, holding it as if it was a small child. The thought makes him feel odd in a way he does not want to examine right now. ‘How did she survive the explosion?’ he asks, suddenly imagining Hux in grief, a precious pet dead, and no comfort to be found. It almost makes him shudder. 

‘She spends the days with me while I’m stuck in here,’ the omega replies. ‘She’s never liked being left alone and Hux prefers someone to keep an eye on her after we almost lost her, twice, once at the destruction of Starkiller Base and then the _Supremacy._ ’

‘Oh,’ is all he can think to say, before it occurs to him ‘Where was she when the traitors attempted to assassinate Hux? Or last time, when we spoke?’

‘She went and hid in one of the medicine cupboards when the shouting started and she’s only just felt safe enough to come out,’ Phasma replies, and then after a moment ‘So, Hux’s personal guard.’

He nods, still eyeing the cat who is very much eyeing him back. ‘Tell me who you have in mind.’


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not sure I like this chapter, but here we are anyway. Next chapter should see Hux return to the narrative in person, instead of Kylo just maneuvering things around him.
> 
> As always thank you all so much for reading, leaving comments and kudos! I really, really do appreciate it.

The process of selecting Hux’s personal guard was an exercise in both patience and self-control. He is actually quite proud of himself. In this moment, right now, he feels almost in control of the situation for the first time since the whole fleet went into season at once. It suggests the very tempting idea that if he tries harder to be a better Supreme Leader/Dominant Alpha then being the Supreme Leader/Dominant Alpha might actually get easier. 

He’d taken Phasma’s suggestions and then gone from ship to ship interviewing and probing the minds of the candidates, carefully winnowing the list down, starting with removing anyone with a sexual preference that includes male omegas. That had removed almost three quarters of the list. He’d then narrowed it further by removing anyone without a sexual preference for male omegas, but who had a specific sexual preference for Hux himself— which had taken out maybe a fifth of the remaining candidates. Then he’d excluded anyone he felt might be inclined to develop a specific sexual interest in Hux if they spent too much time in the omega’s company— which left him with about fifteen people. He’d then removed anyone who had even the slightest doubts about Hux’s leadership or role as Dominant Omega or even the faintest tinge of disloyalty to their thoughts— which had only gotten rid of one, and that was only after he’d decided to include momentary doubts that were later assuaged (He had to concede that Phasma had done a good job of choosing loyal candidates.) He had then considered who might have the training, or the potential with further training, to be able to best protect Hux. 

The whole process had been difficult, startling, irritating, disconcerting, infuriating— and yet he had managed to keep in control of himself. In truth he feels that he has every reason to feel proud. 

The first difficulty to deal with had been the wariness and distrust the candidates had displayed the moment he’d approached. Their first thought as he approached, every one of them, was that his intention was to kill them, so they’d bristled, become defensive, body language subconsciously becoming aggressive. His own alpha nature had responded to that aggression with aggression of his own, but he’d reached for the Force, used it to calm himself, managed not to respond by issuing challenges and ripping off heads. 

The second difficulty was his response to the desire for Hux he read in so many minds, but he does not wish to think on that right now.

The third difficulty was— in truth the third difficulty was FN-2295. A male beta— and he had originally planned not to even interview any male betas for Hux’s personal guard, but Phasma had chosen several of them and two had made it all the way to the final selection pool— a male beta whose first response to his approach had been to panic and then, in the male’s terror that he’d be able to sense it with the Force(not that the Stormtrooper was entirely sure what the Force actually was), accidentally loudly project a long held fantasy of himself head down and ass up beneath the Stormtrooper. He’d felt himself go red, choke on his own spit, waver in place as he desperately tried to untangle his own sense of self from the beta’s desires. 

Somehow FN-2295 had realised what he’d done, though not how he’d done it, panicked even worse, and then barraged him with another set of fantasies— this time not just of himself, but of most of the better looking or higher ranked alphas of the fleet in various compromising positions best summed up as “worshipping beta cock.”

In honesty he’d actually been too startled in the moment to even strike out at the man, which had probably saved the Stormtrooper’s life, and by the time the moment was passed and his mind was back in working order what he’d been able to sense from the beta was a combination of regret and the great honour the man felt at having served under Hux. There was no contempt for his General there, no anger, no desire to dominate or subjugate, only a deep wellspring of respect for the omega. Still— he cringes even at the memory of himself in the Stormtrooper’s fantasies. Being thought of like that, like a mindless omega in an alpha/omega porn holo, is oddly— almost contaminating? How do omegas deal with it? 

The choice not to kill FN-2295 for his debasing fantasies was hard, but the man is loyal, loyal to Hux, loyal to himself, and beyond that loyalty a good soldier— it feels like the sort of choice a proper Dominant Alpha would make, putting the safety of the pack above their own personal comfort. So FN-2295 lives to fight another day, but that other day will not be as a member of Hux’s personal guard. He does not think he could cope with having to come into contact with the beta too often. 

He actually ended up choosing the other male beta, much to his own surprise, but then perhaps on reflection it is not so much of a surprise. FN-2037, another Stormtrooper, has desires very much in line with those of Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio. Big, strong alphas with big, fat knots. The man’s otherwise perfect record is only marred by a series of incidents in which he put several other Stormtroopers, and a handful of officers, every one of them betas, and most of them male, in the medbay. Investigation had eventually proved that each time FN-2037 had acted only on provocation, in response to harassment and assaults that had resulted from members of his squad catching him with catching him actually on the knot of an alpha and spreading it around the ranks— the alpha in question an officer who had subsequently severed all connection between the two of them and now pretends FN-2037 does not exist. 

There is hurt there in FN-2037’s mind, hurt and a hell of a lot of anger. Deserved anger, he thinks, and part of him feels bad as an alpha, as if the officer’s misdeeds reflect the conduct of all their sex. There is no crime in desiring betas in place of omegas, even in desiring _male_ betas. Why should an alpha be so ashamed that they pretend the man they were all so keen to get on their knot, the man they courted, praised, told they loved, actually built a _nest_ for, doesn’t exist after getting caught? And the betas— the cruelty they have, and continue to, display towards FN-2037 is infuriating. And incomprehensible. Why? He can read the shame and hurt and resentment in FN-2037’s mind, in Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio’s mind, in the mockery of others, in the cruelty of the beta Stormtroopers, in the jokes he’s heard, in things his own father has said about male betas or alphas who were _like that_ (and always the implication that _he’d_ better not turn out like that, even though there never was any chance of it.(there’d been moments of resentment when he’d almost wished for it, just to piss his father off, but pretty female betas—( _pretty male omegas_ ).)) before being told off by his mother or uncle—but he has never understood it. At least as a member of Hux’s guard the beta will be safe— 

It wasn’t just the tangle of protectiveness and guilt he’d felt that led him to choose FN-2037. Hux shines bright in the Stormtrooper’s memory, the first commanding officer who had not immediately placed the blame on the Stormtrooper, who had not made the man feel as if living in constant fear of attack was his own fault because of the nature of his sexuality. Hux had come down harshly on FN-2037’s assailants, punishing them for spreading disorder in the ranks and acting against official First Order policy (or at least official wherever Hux’s command is recognised) regarding alternative sexualities— and here he had felt from the man an odd sense of gratitude for the fact that Hux had also bequeathed a —considerably lesser— punishment on FN-2037 for acting alone instead of reporting the situation directly to Hux— even though lesser ranked officers were aware of it(officers who were also punished—more severely— by Hux). The Stormtrooper was left with the impression that he can, in fact _must,_ report such harassment to Hux, and be believed, and have the report acted on. The other positive— for FN-2037 at least— effect of him being issued a light punishment was that the situation was eased with some of the troops who have no issue with his sexuality but would otherwise have looked on him as a snitch for reporting what was happening in the first place. 

Other than FN-2037 he chose one female beta, two female omegas and a female alpha for Hux’s personal guard, none of them interested in male omegas. The female beta selected was Ensign Nrodia Uskais, who had grown up on a colony in constant fear of predation by slave traders, and who had been forced to learn to fight at a very early age to keep herself and her family safe. When the colony had finally been all but destroyed in a raid the remaining members of her family had fled in their battered old cruiser, heading for First Order space due to reports of repeated raids by First Order ships on slave ships and slaver colonies. The vessel that had rescued her family when their cruiser had finally broken down had been commanded by Hux, a much younger man, and she will forever feel herself in his debt for the kindness he had shown them, the mercy, the way he had welcomed them to the First Order. Sexually she is no threat to Hux, as her sexual desires are very narrowly limited to male betas— much to her own exasperation much of the time. 

It was difficult to bring himself to choose another alpha even though part of him would have preferred to choose more of them, for their strength if nothing else, and Phasma certainly suggested quite a few exceedingly loyal ones, but in so many of their minds was Hux almost a divinity. Pale and pretty, smelling lush and fertile, a creature almost to be worshiped at the feet of, to nuzzle their way between his thighs and please him, lure him back to their nests and render him stupid with desire, before so very gently pushing up inside, lodging their knots while they pet his smooth skin and press kisses to his long neck. 

After interviewing each one he’d had to go and sit by himself for a while, draw deep on the Force, not let the urge to growl and puff up and go and track them down and challenge them, prove to them exactly who the Dominant Alpha is, exactly who is the only one in the entire First Order with any right to— he breaks off the thought. No. He does not want Hux— but, at the same time, he does not want anyone else having Hux either. 

So the only other alpha he chose was FN-1905, a woman who admires and respects all omegas, and thinks Hux hard working and self-sacrificing, and that he would better be able to do his job if others (namely himself and Snoke) stopped getting in the redhead’s way. Though she is an alpha, and naturally a potential rival, he found that FN-1905 has no sexual interest in any of the male-bodied sub-genders, and beyond that has been happily mated for the last three years to FN-1923, one of the omegas he has selected. 

FN-1923, FN-1905’s mate, is not currently in heat as she— like Phasma— was seriously injured during the battle over Crait, taking a wound to the abdomen that almost killed her. Even now if he thinks too long on it there’s a danger he’ll become caught in a memory of the terror FN-1905 felt in almost losing her mate, that beloved body lying so still in the medical berth, the thought of a nest ever empty, a voice never heard again, warmth no longer shared, the drive to live and to be a better alpha evaporating into nothing. He can remember the moment FN-1923 woke from both perspectives, her own and that of FN-1905, the first sight of each other, the sense that things may now be ok. Being together felt like home, and that’s a feeling he almost envies— While FN-1923 has already physically recovered the medidroids have informed the pair that due to the nature of the injury it may be as long as a year before she resumes a normal heat cycle, so it’s unlikely she’ll go out in sympathy at a later date and thus distract both herself and her mate from their duty. 

As well as her suitability to the task FN-1923 considers the opportunity to be on Hux’s personal guard a great honour, and though she tried to hide it from him, he sensed in her the quiet wish that after Snoke’s death he had died also, and that the First Order had come under the sole control of Hux. Her Utopia is one led entirely by omegas, no Dominant Alphas there. Secretly she dislikes both male betas and male alphas, and thinks them prone to acting like entitled shits that get more from society than they deserve, while putting in less effort than even female alphas(who she distrusts as a group, though is very fond of some select individuals, such as her mate). Her sexual preference, like her mate’s, is for the female bodied sub-genders, though she has a marked preference for female omegas. This does not change the fact that she loves and desires her mate, a thing that at first had confused him a little, but was ultimately immaterial as it would not impact her capacity to do her duty to Hux. 

The final member of Hux’s personal guard is another female omega. Another Stormtrooper, FN-0954, who has the neatest, tidiest mind he thinks he has ever encountered. She admires Hux’s mind, his knowledge, his capacity as a scientist and engineer. Secretly she longs to be a tech, but she was enrolled in the Stormtrooper programme as an infant so the choice is not hers to make. To her Hux is a beacon of order, of control, of chaos and all the things about the universe she does not understand tamed and brought under control. She does not like _him_ , because she cannot understand him, but she hopes Hux will find a way to yoke him— a thought that had hardly endears her to him. As far as he can tell she has no sexual desires. She is in heat, he can sense it from her, smell it on her, but inside her mind it’s more an unfocussed annoyance than a drive to fuck anyone in particular. So, in truth, he finds her no more comprehensible than she does him. She’s intelligent though, and ruthless, and loyal to his General, so that is probably the best he can hope for. 

The low opinion of him shared by many of those he has chosen for Hux’s personal guard is another sacrifice he had to make to ensure the safety of his General, and another reason he feels right to be proud of himself. It feels good to think he’s finally getting this whole business right. Self sacrifice is right, isn’t it? That’s the quality most admired in Dominant Alphas in all the dramas.

Content with his selection for Hux’s personal guard, happy with the choice of Hux’s new rooms, he returns to the bridge to inform his General, excited to see Hux’s pleasure in the choices he’s made. He walks in to find Hux determinately not paying any attention whatsoever to the three alphas putting on displays of their physical prowess a carefully preserved distance from each other. The growl, when it slips out, is deep, loud, almost seems to make the bridge itself vibrate.


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which things do not go as Kylo expects. 
> 
> I am a tired and headachy human, so I am going to post this earlier than I usually would and creep off to bed. Thank you all so much for reading! I hope you are all having/have had a great day!

The growls that come in response to his presence are a thing he can almost ignore by now, confident that none of these pathetic alphas are any threat to him. All eyes go to him as he stalks towards the scene, even Hux’s pale, pretty ones, and he feels a thrill at that, that he can attract the omega’s attention when these other, lesser alphas cannot. He can feel Hux’s anxiety spike at his approach at the same time as the redhead’s scent sours, he can feel apprehension, the conviction that he is about to do something to humiliate or hurt the omega. He is not. He has learned his lesson. But still, his own eyes slant across to the alphas still determinately displaying even though the sour stink of fear is now clouding their pheromones— 

The three have stripped down to their trousers and undershirts as they stretch and flex, contorting their bodies to their best advantage. For a moment he wonders why they’re not just attacking each other, an alpha might display like this if they come across a desirable omega without any other challengers nearby, but no amount of careful posing is ever going to be the same, is never going to display an alphas physicality to such effect, as a fight. A quick brush across their minds brings the memory of Hux’s voice, the words _“Anyone I catch fighting on my bridge will be automatically thrown in the brig!”_

It’s some reassurance. Hux doesn’t welcome their displays, which is confirmed as he brushes his mind against the redhead’s. The alphas are irritating his General. The redhead wishes they’d just get over themselves and go back to doing their jobs, they should know by now he isn’t interested. 

‘I will count to ten,’ he finds himself declaring as he comes to a rest by Hux’s side, ‘and when I am done I will consider anyone who remains on the bridge who does not have work to do here, or who is not actually doing it, to be issuing me with a personal challenge. Am I understood?’

‘Yes Supreme Leader!’ comes yelped from all sides, some of the lurkers heading towards the exit before he even finishes saying ‘One.’

The last to leave are the three alphas displaying themselves, as well as a couple of the other alphas watching, this latest lot with their assessing eyes. When he begins his count the three alphas eye each other, none wanting to be the first to break, but eventually the older male with the dark skin decides that discretion is the better part of valour, and retreats with a mind full of plans to attempt to win Hux on another day. The two remaining, the young male, brunet, in his early twenties, younger in fact than either Hux or himself, puffs up as large as he can make himself for a moment, hormones and confusion and disappointment all at war inside, before he finally slinks off, stinking of defeat. This leaves the final alpha, a female, blonde hair almost as pale as her eerily white skin. He can sense it in her, the urge not to retreat, to stand up to him, to issue a challenge. She thinks she might be able to win, as long as he doesn’t use the Force— but, no, Hux said no fighting. So she straightens herself up to her impressive height and leaves just as his mouth shapes itself into the beginning of “ten.” Her strangely dark eyes, dark as his own, meet his gaze as she walks past. She despises him. She thinks he is no alpha. She’s sure he couldn’t please Hux even if he ever did manage to coerce the General into berth. 

He lurches towards her as she dawdles, snapping his teeth, a reminder of what he is, what she is, what he could do to her if she really challenged him. It’s mindless, without thought, his inner alpha slipping its leash for a moment. Still it’s satisfying to see her flinch back, to feel her courage falter, and the knowledge that he has won this little interaction is enough to let him regain his senses. 

Turning his attention to Hux he finds the redhead observing him, face carefully neutral. That burn across Hux’s cheek is still red, even looking at it angers him. Soon it will be gone, he reminds himself. His General’s emotions are a tangle, hard to distinguish, amusement, irritation, gratitude, resentment. The best he can take from what he senses without probing deep enough to cause Hux discomfort is that his General is glad that those lurking near him and trying to catch his attention have finally left for a while. Hux knows they’ll be back, much to the redhead’s annoyance they always come back. Hux finds it all exhausting. 

‘I have nothing to report Supreme Leader,’ Hux informs him before he has a chance to speak. ‘There have been no incidents, our ships are in good working order, and we have heard nothing of the Resistance.’

‘That’s good,’ he replies, quickly turning his attention to the issues at hand. ‘I have selected some new living quarters for you.’

‘I see,’ Hux replies, thoughts flickering across the surface of his mind wondering what small, crappy rooms he’ll be relegated to, hoping he will not have to share with anyone, and reminding himself that it hardly matters where he sleeps because there are plenty of rooms he can requisition to work in and the work is what counts. 

It’s almost exciting, imagining how Hux will react to the knowledge that his every expectation is wrong. The redhead will be so grateful, so impressed, so flattered that he is considered worthy of the best set of rooms on the ship. A smile almost breaking out at the corners of his mouth he informs Hux of his choice. 

Confusion. ‘What?’ slips from between Hux’s lips. ‘No. Surely you must be joking.’ He can feel the suspicion in Hux’s mind.

He assures Hux that he is not joking. Hux does not believe him. He cannot believe that Hux does not believe him. Worse than not believing him is the suspicion ever increasing in the redhead’s mind. He insists that he’s not joking. 

‘Why?’ Hux asks after a moment’s thought, that suspicion crystalizing. The smell of distressed omega thickens in the air, choking, water-blossoms losing the last of their sweetness. He tries to snort it out of his nose, to no effect. His General’s mind is cycling through worries, fearing one moment that it’s a trap, and the next concerned this may be some attempt at courting. He’s not sure what he finds more insulting— actually he is sure. _Hux’s fear that this is some attempt at courting, and the thought that the redhead will not be able to handle it if it is, and that he might just **force** Hux, and that no, the redhead is sure he’s being vain to even consider for a moment that this is some proof of interest, and then back around to worrying that it is. _

‘I have no interest in fucking you,’ he snaps, just to make sure Hux understands where he’s coming from.

The redhead recoils, a sense of something small and hurt at the back of the omega’s mind, before Hux manages to compose himself. ‘I did not believe you did,’ his General’s thoughts ring with conviction here, a sense of shame that the idea had ever crossed his mind, and then anger at the way he always seems to do his best to confuse the redhead. Guilt, but he waves it away. It is not his fault that his absence of desire makes Hux feel bad about himself. He does not desire Hux. _He does not._ ‘If this is not some misguided courting gift then why are you insisting I take those rooms?’

‘They are the only ones appropriate for an omega of your station,’ he replies, knowing as he does that his defensiveness makes the words come out harsh, contemptuous. He can smell the stink of angry alpha, the scent coming from himself. Part of him starts screaming at the back of his mind. He’s fucking this all up. 

‘That can’t be true,’ Hux shakes his head. ‘I know for a fact that there are several sets of officer’s quarters vacant right now.’

‘They’re not good enough,’ he states, not explaining himself.

‘Why?’ Hux insists, getting ever more wary by the second. He can sense that with the idea of this being related to courting off the table the only thing the redhead can think is that it’s a trap. Except the his General cannot work out what kind of trap it is, and that’s just making the omega more worried.

‘I don’t have to explain myself to you,’ he tells his General. ‘Consider it an order. You will take those rooms.’ Hux opens his mouth to argue, but, he interrupts, ‘An order Hux!’

Eventually the redhead bites out the words ‘As you wish, Supreme Leader,’ resentment in every syllable. He feels bad now. He wishes he didn’t feel bad. This isn’t how he expected things to go. 

An awkward silence descends between them, the water-blossom scent of distressed omega heavy in the air. He can feel curiosity in the minds of those watching, can feel their attention on himself and his General and not the work they are supposed to be doing. ‘Do I need to repeat what I said about people on my bridge not doing their work?!’ he snarls. Fear. It spikes in the air and across his mind. He feels it when their collective attention is focused back on their jobs.

‘Is there something else you wanted, Supreme Leader?’ Hux eventually bites out. 

For a moment he contemplates not telling Hux about his new personal guard. He now suspects the redhead will not be grateful, will not understand why this needs to be, but then he thinks of how Hux will react if the redhead finds out later. ‘I have assigned you a personal guard. This is not optional, you can’t argue your way out of it, so you had better just accept it,’ he snarls, overdefensive, expecting Hux’s protestations. 

There is a pause, Hux’s mind flittering from one topic to another, the sense of frustration and exhaustion and humiliation paramount, the fear that if the redhead argues too stridently he’ll lash out, kill the omega and that infuriates him, but his past actions are gnawing at his conscience. ‘Fine,’ the redhead bites out. ‘Fine. When can I expect them?’

‘In the morning,’ he replies, which is when Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio will be released from the medbay and he will have had the opportunity to work out what orders to give them all, as well as a training programme. They’ll need uniforms too— Perhaps he didn’t think all of this through properly. He’s been hasty, he’s always too hasty. He can almost feel his uncle’s fond, and always ever so gentle, rebuke. In reality he is not really prepared. He feels deflated, his earlier pride fading to nothing. Is it because Hux is an omega that he now feels so very tired?

A rueful snort of a laugh from Hux. ‘I will eagerly anticipate their arrival,’ spoken with near deadpan sarcasm. 

It’s all too much for him. Hux is angering him, why must the man be so stubborn? He can’t though. He can’t strike out. Striking Hux, hurting Hux, humiliating Hux— that’s what led to the assassination attempt. He does not want Hux to die, he just wished his General was more obedient. That’s it, isn’t it? His feelings for the omega are still objective, aren’t they? Why does the idea of hurting Hux make him feel so sick suddenly? He has never hesitated before— 

He turns and leaves, without even acknowledging the redhead. He needs some space. Some time to think— perhaps his training rooms. No. No, how about back to his own rooms with a holo porn? The dark haired female beta this time, like usual. Rut is still nagging at the edges of his mind and there’s only so much the Force can do to keep it at bay. He’ll think clearer once he’s come. This tangle he feels about Hux will untangle itself.

As he leaves the Bridge he smells, senses, feels an alpha peel away from the wall and approach, no hostility, but has no patience for dealing with anyone right now, so he ignores the male, stalking past towards his rooms.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we go, the end of another week and the posting of another chapter. I hope everyone has a good weekend! Thank you all for reading, leaving comments and kudos!

The usual female beta porn is unsatisfying. He jerks off roughly, squeezing his knot with hard, heavy pulses until he comes, orgasm over with almost as soon as it arrives, no amount of knot stimulation making it last. The beta is pretty, like usual, the false knot she uses is massive, like usual, he’s pretty sure she actually comes, like usual— judging from the rhythmic pulsing of the muscles of her cunt stretched wide around the toy, the convulsions of her body, the sounds she makes— but he is left wanting at the end, which is not like usual. 

He feels guilty, which is just making him feel angry, all of which is making him resent Hux. Why couldn’t the redhead just be grateful, be pleased that he was showing some concern, doing his best to be a better Dominant Alpha? He doesn’t feel like the Dominant Alpha right now, he feels like himself as a teenager, all restless energy and an eternal well of anger that he can’t own up to in fear of being rejected by his mother and his uncle. 

Rut still gnaws at him. He lost his grip on the Force a little some time when he had his hand on his knot and now it’s hard to convince himself to call on it again. It feels like a collar, like a yoke; he feels like he’s never going to be free, there’s always something holding him back. 

Fucking Hux—

Maybe he should try watching an alpha/omega porn. Something with a pretty, little redhead male getting shown their place by a big, dark-haired alpha with a massive knot— his rage deflates. The excitement he expects, almost _wants,_ doesn’t come. What is he doing?

For a moment he wishes that he had someone he could turn to, someone he could talk to(someone who would comfort him). Luke was always the best at it. His mother’s first instinct was always to fix whatever was going wrong, his father’s always seemed to be to do his best to ignore it, Luke was the only one who ever really asked him what he _felt_ about anything, to ask him what _he_ wanted to do about whatever was wrong. That’s true, isn’t it? Yes. When did he stop feeling like he could turn to his uncle? Was it just when, for the merest moment, he wanted to fuck the man? By the Force itself he’s so fucked up.

_Is he actually a monster?_

He just— He needs to get away from himself for a moment, not by meditating, he doesn’t want peace, he just needs a moment to feel good about something. Eyes glance at his holoprojector. He slumps back down onto his leather couch and loads up that porn, the one with the male omega in his nest. It’s nice. The way the omega talks to his mate. Nice. Wholesome. He wonders what the alpha who received this holo felt. It must have been nice, a good reminder of being valued, loved, desired. He wonders if the two are still alive, somewhere out there, still together. He hopes so.

This time he jerks off slowly, more playing with his dick, his knot, than frantic to come. His eyes keep lingering on that pale and pretty form, that well built nest. It would be nice, wouldn’t it, to built a nest like that? To know for sure he could build a nest like that? He wouldn’t even have to have an omega, or a beta, to put in the nest. It could just be a practice nest. Alphas are supposed to build practice nests, aren’t they? Especially when they’re young. He knows he never really did. Luke had always been so worried about his refusal to even try, but his father had just waved it off— maybe he would have been more eager if his father had ever bothered to teach him _how_ , but Han had left him to work it out for himself and his earliest attempts had all gone wrong. He needed more practice, but— and this he couldn’t bring himself to tell his uncle— but it had felt weird, embarrassing, to build a practice nest at the temple, where the other students would find out and mock him. They would have mocked him. He never was popular. Never able to get on with his peers. Still can’t. 

People being afraid of him is not the same as them liking him.

For a moment his mind goes back to Luke, to his uncle’s kind words and kind hands and small little smile, but it’s not Luke, it’s Hux he sees, Hux praising him, Hux comforting him, Hux listening to him, Hux content and safe in his presence. He comes. Teeth snapping down into the padding of his couch’s arm, mind a blur, a blear of want and desire and the fantasy that it’s a long, pale nape caught gently in a mounting bite. It seems to arrive out of nowhere, but unlike his last orgasm this one continues and continues and continues, him hunched over, mouthing stupidly at the arm of the couch. 

When it finally ends he slumps over and stares at nothing, eyes eventually refocussing to catch the very end of the holo, the omega once more repeating how much he misses his mate, how much he loves his mate, before the holo ends and resets, pretty pale omega frozen in waiting to be loaded again. He’d missed that final bit last time. Has anyone actually ever loved him?

Fuck, he’s feeling maudlin.

Fuck— Realistically he’s got another reason to apologize to Hux. Not that he ever will, he never was any good at apologies. He always meant to do better—

He handled earlier badly. The redhead has no reason to trust him. He reminds himself, for what has to be the millionth time in his life, that _other people can’t read his mind the way he can theirs._

His eyes go back to the omega, still and waiting for his mate. How do people do it? How do they manage to form those intimate interpersonal connections? He’d almost thought he’d succeeded with Rey but—

He reaches for the Force, draws deep on the Dark Side, wraps it around his holoprojector, preparing to destroy it. The action accidentally starts the holo. The omega’s soft voice, so affectionate, fills the cold and angry spaces of his mind. He lets go. Lets the holoprojector be, keeping the Force wrapped tight, keeping himself under control. Leaning forward, his eyes eating up all the details of the holo once more. 

The fire of the lust rut induces is banked for now, so his attention goes to odd little details, the near perfect curve of the nest, the crinkle at the corner of the omega’s eyes, the way the man sinks gently into the evident softness of the nest padding— why is this the first porn he’s ever seen that’s like this? That seems intimate and comfortable and not— whatever it is about most porn that’s so off-putting. Is there more porn out there like this? Where there’s one there’s usually more. How to find it though?

He goes back to the holo’s loading page, endlessly grateful that his holo-console is as well encrypted as all his communications hardware, meaning that he can do this, can watch whatever new porn he wants even though they’re on communications lockdown, can investigate that porn. Tags, there are tags aren’t there? _Self fisting. Fisting. Male omega. In heat. In nest. Masturbation. **Porn for alphas.**_ Huh? He almost clicks on it, but his attention is caught by the name of the person who uploaded it in the first place. _Reuploads for real alphas_

He selects it. What he expects in their collection is more of what he’s used to, more debasing alpha/omega porn with mainly female omegas being almost entirely dehumanised. That is not what he gets. _In nest; _a majority of the holos include the words in their title. A majority are omegas, and a couple of betas he sees, masturbating. There are both females and males, following along the roughly 70/30 split in favour of female omegas seen in nature. The few with alphas are all in nests and mostly include some variation on the words _affectionate/loving/gentle_ or even _worshipful_ in the title, and beyond that most seem to be of the alpha eating the omega out, with only a few including actual penetration. Then there are oddities like _Pretty omega examines and approves of nest_ and _Affectionate omega pretends to ignore you while waiting for you to impress her_ and _Omega sleeping in nest feeling safe_ and _Sexy omega shows off nape of neck._ __

__This is not what he expected. Something seems to be wrong here. Is this a trick?_ _

__Which is how he finds himself reading the comments on a series of porn holos trying to work out what the fuck is going on. Things he learns very quickly— people claiming to be alphas really like this kind of porn. Anyone who says they don’t like this kind of porn or complains about the fact that the omega (or beta) is male or that no one’s being bitten or spat on is immediately piled on and accused of being a beta. As well as this, any reference to an omega as a “bitch” or a “whore” or a “slut” will get shut down very quickly and the person using the term utterly savaged and again called a beta. Every now and then someone will claim to be a beta and defensively point out how much they like this kind of porn too. Which must be a difficult thing to do because complaints about betas and “beta-directed porn” also take up a large amount of the comments. People claiming to be alphas really like it when the omegas (or betas) in the porn they’re watching are enjoying themselves. One of the most popular holos is the one where the omega, a plump and really astonishingly beautiful dark-skinned woman, turns away from the viewer, glancing back over her shoulder every now and then with body language and expression signalling a kind of teasing attraction and saying things to invite the alpha watching to work harder to impress her, before finally turning around at the end and holding out her arms as if just waiting for the alpha to climb into them. There is a great deal of preoccupation in how safe the omega (or beta) must feel in the holo, with any sign that the omega (or beta) may feel unsafe or even be mildly uncomfortable resulting in calls for the holo to be deleted immediately as well as demands to know were the omega (or beta) is as if the audience wants to rush in and rescue them. At least a third of the comments on any holo involving a nest are discussions of nest building techniques as well as criticisms and attacks on those criticisms of the nest in the holo in question. Any mention of nest building techniques is likely to devolve into an argument until someone brings up a series of holos by an alpha called Gressidia Amdana that they all agree are the definitive guide to nest building._ _

__This is how he ends up searching for that set of holos by that alpha and spending far too many hours of his night watching this calm, friendly, no-nonsense middle aged female alpha explain all she’s learnt about nest building after long years of hard study, having grown up the child of two omegas in a small community with no alpha role model to learn from, having made a lot of mistakes in her youth before she ventured out into the stars and started talking to other alphas and, especially, omegas about the business, and now wanting to do her part for other alphas in a similar situation. The holos are old. From some time near the end of the Republic just before the rise of the Empire, which is evident in the clothes she wears and the references she makes, and there are comments on all the copies of her holos he finds wondering what happened to her. Apparently she disappeared some time during the transition from Republic to Empire—the consensus being that she probably died, and any record of her death was lost in the chaos of that time._ _

__The holos are interesting to watch. She goes over many techniques from many worlds, the best ways to combine techniques, and the best types of nests for various situation. One of the things she stresses is the importance of fitting the nest to the omega’s requirements. It is best to speak to the omega in question, not to interrogate them, but to gently ask them if they have preferences regarding nests, to maybe suggest looking at images of the various typical nest shapes and constructions if they’re not sure, though to never push the issue if they’re not comfortable. She also gives advice for the best forms for a courting nest, when— unless an understanding has already been reached between alpha and omega— the omega’s acceptance of the alpha may rely heavily on their approval of a nest that the alpha will have to construct without their consultation. In her opinion traditional forms are best for courting nests, with more attention needing to be paid to aesthetics than the highly comfort-based nest of an established pair, and with careful scenting applied. With a calm and earnest face she informs her audience that ‘it is appropriate for the alpha to scent mark a courting nest, but to be careful about the nature of the scents they lay down. Scenting the nest too lustfully, by climbing into it fully aroused and rolling about, or even ejaculating inside of the nest, may send the wrong message to a prospective omega and put them off. It is better to lie in the nest and think affectionate and protective thoughts, to lay down scents associated with love and safety, and not pure animal lust.’_ _

__It’s all rather fascinating. He ends up watching every holo he can find, from the one detailing the weaving of a traditional Coruscanti courting nest, to how to build an emergency nest if your omega suddenly goes into heat when you’re away from home and regular nesting supplies, to the best forms for nests if your omega has experienced trauma or may otherwise feel exceptionally vulnerable during heat. Here she has a few suggestions, some for short-walled or even no-walled nests for omegas who need to feel less penned in, and others for highly traditional domed nests only accessible through a narrow opening that the alpha can easily guard._ _

__When he finally runs out of holos to watch it is the early morning and he is almost _possessed_ by an irresistible urge to build a practice nest of his own. He has nothing on hand that he can weave into more permanent walls, but she gave him plenty of ideas for nests solely made out of fabric and cushions— like the last nest he’d tried to build. He finds himself once more gathering up everything he can find and having another go. _ _

__In the end he’s left with something— well, it’s not good. It certainly wouldn’t win an omega if it came down to them choosing him based on his nest building capacity, but at the same time it’s indescribably better than his last attempt. He’s not quite proud of himself, but looking at the thing he feels closer to peace than he has since things went so badly wrong with Hux earlier. Maybe that’s why he choses to sleep in it rather than dissembling it to remake his berth. He wakes grinding his hips into the padding of its base, trying to push his knot into something that’s not there, his mind a haze of water-blossom scent and copper red hair._ _


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we have another chapter, not the longest one, but still I hope it won't disappoint.   
> I just want to remind you all how much I appreciate you, and I hope you are all having/ have had a good weekend!

He leaves his rooms intending to try and make peace with Hux. It’s true that he has to meet with his General’s new personal guard to issue them their orders first, and set them the training programmes he eventually devised while lounging in his practice nest, but after that he’s going to— he’s going to— Hm. He’s not exactly sure what he’s going to do. Asking Hux to sit down with him so they can discuss their relationship— _working_ relationship— feels like it would leave him far too vulnerable. Maybe he should just apologize and then order Hux to forgive him? No. Fuck no. That would be indescribably childish—

He’ll just have to work it out at the time. 

‘Excuse me, Supreme Leader?’ he looks up to see an alpha approaching. An officer, a Captain he believes, neat, tall, with decent looks, more conventionally handsome than he is himself— though certainly not the handsomest man in the fleet— and exuding a level of confidence that almost makes him seem to be begging for a punch. Unless he’s mistaken the man’s one of the new lot hanging around on the bridge. His scent’s familiar— he has a vague impression of being approached before but paying the man no heed at the time. 

‘What?’ he snaps, slowing to a stop and turning his full attention to the alpha.

‘I was wondering if I could discuss something with you, in private?’ the man replies in yet another posher-than-posh Core World accent, undaunted by his less than welcoming expression.

He narrows his eyes at the man. ‘You’re a ship’s Captain, and not the Captain of the Finalizer, what are you doing on my vessel?’

‘You are correct Supreme Leader,’ the man replies, smiling in a way— it’s smarmy, that’s what it is. There’s no other way to describe it. The man is smarmy. ‘I Captain the _Absolute,_ but I have left her in the care of a most-trusted Lieutenant so I could come and speak with you.’

He tries to remember if Captains are allowed to do that, to leave their ships to visit others without the express permission of either Hux or himself. His mind draws a blank. It doesn’t seem like the sort of thing that should be permitted though. ‘What do you want to discuss?’ he asks, then reaches out to probe the man’s mind without waiting for an answer. 

_Hux. The alpha wants permission to court Hux. There is no love there, no maddened desire, none of the worshipful respect for the redhead that he has read in the minds of so many. It’s not that this alpha exactly despises Hux either, or finds the idea arousing to humiliate him, denigrate him, dominate him, though the idea of dominating him is certainly floating around in the alpha’s thoughts. And the alpha’s thoughts are a complicated thing, calm on the surface, confident all the way through, but there are other things lurking beneath, rising up and being pushed down without ever becoming fully clear. The important thing is that the main reason the officer wants permission to court Hux is simply that, because Hux has now been proved to be in the Supreme Leader’s favour, having the redhead for a mate might be politically advantageous and this alpha wants to get a chance before the other like-minded alphas make their attempts. The alpha thinks Hux is not hideous, is probably fertile from his scent, most assuredly a virgin from everything he’s heard, well connected, and— with the proper alpha— once brought into line, encouraged into appropriate behaviour for an omega, may prove to be quite an acceptable mate._

‘No!’ he snaps, teeth bared. ‘You cannot court General Hux.’

‘This is hardly the appropriate venue for such a discussion,’ the man rebukes, as if such a man, such an alpha, should ever feel they have the right to do so. This is a level of confidence he himself has never approached, never knelt at the foot of. This is a level of confidence that comes from good breeding, no real childhood difficulties, and growing up with the impression that you automatically have a right to anything you desire. ‘It’s rather vulgar, is it not, to discuss the courting of such a high-ranking omega in the halls?’

‘I do not care,’ he replies, feeling himself puff up, his own body language becoming threatening whether he wants it to or not. ‘It doesn’t matter where we discuss it. I am not giving you permission to court General Hux.’

With that same smarmy smile and no awareness whatsoever of how thin the ice he’s skating on is becoming the alpha continues talking. ‘Forgive me if I seem insubordinate, but why not? You have more than proved you have no interest in the omega yourself, so why not encourage him into accepting an appropriate courtship? Allowing him to remain single hardly reflects well on the First Order.’

‘In what way does it reflect badly on the First Order?’ he snarls, the answer evident in the other alpha’s surface thoughts, eerily all too similar to what he found in the mind of the Hux’s would-be-assassins. Hux doesn’t know his place. It’s inappropriate for an unmated omega to be so high in the ranks unsupported by their mate’s status. Added to that the idea that the Galaxy as a whole must find them weak, pitiful, to let themselves be ordered around by an _uppity little bitch._ And there. That sticks. 

While there isn’t exactly a lot of anger for Hux as an individual, deep in the man’s mind, well beneath his surface thoughts, there are thoughts about omegas, not so much violent, but certainly edged with something like contempt. Omegas are less than alphas. Less intelligent, less capable, less rational, and just _less_ all the way round. And underneath it all, underpinning it, are memories. _This alpha’s Sire, his father, another alpha, and his Dam, his mother, an omega. Quiet unless called on to entertain. Never asked her own opinions. Never allowed to express her thoughts, or even expected to think at all. Criticised for any change in appearance, any weight gained, any choice of fashion different to what her alpha approved of. Always neatly dressed, her waist tiny, corseted in, feet always in heels, face always painted, smile always on, scent always absent from the use of scent suppressants. Anything she did that her mate saw as less than obedient met with a light, open palmed slap across her face, painful but not bruising, and above all humiliating, humiliating like her entire life_ — and all of this this officer took in, alongside both parent’s affection for him and unqualified support, and his father’s constant obvious pride in his alpha son, and all together it formed the man in front of him, a man that sees nothing even remotely wrong with the way his father treated him mother, a man who would inevitably do the same to Hux.

_**Rage.**_

He curls a tangle of the Force around the alpha, slams him against the wall. ‘You will stay away from him!’ he snarls, at war with his temper.

Still, even though fear rises in the other alpha, that lifetime of confidence, that lifetime of getting his own way, seems to obscure for the man the reality of this situation. ‘Have you asked the General what he wants? If he wants me to stay away? I am rather a good catch.’ the alpha says, as though expecting Hux to be grateful to be courted by such a man.

The thought sticks. Is this the kind of alpha Hux desires? Posh like this, from the same background, from the same culture, from the same breeding, and— while certainly no epitome of alpha beauty— a decent looking man, tall and well proportioned, confident, what some might call charming, and not some eternally awkward, odd looking, realistically socially challenged, angry, ugly, failure of a Dominant Alpha? His temper frays. 

He closes his eyes against the spray of blood, the other alpha not even realising the danger until he had wrapped the Force around his head and halfway yanked it off. When it’s done. When the last pump of that dying heart has forced out the final trickle from the ragged stump that was once a neck he lets the body go, lets it slump into a pile in the hall, then turns back the way he came and stalks back to his rooms. He will have to clean up before meeting with Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio and the others of Hux’s guard. 

There may be a complication. A new, unexpected complication. One that just might be his own fault, though he doesn’t know how. _He can no longer deny it, he seems to have developed romantic feelings for Hux._


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNING: For clarity's sake I will say no one is getting raped in this chapter and there is no mention of either Hux or Kylo being raped in the past, but this chapter will have issues of rape and domestic violence, and people being profoundly sexually inappropriate towards Hux in the past- including when he was under age.
> 
> I wonder what you all will think of this chapter... I hope you like it. Like usual I'd like to thank you all for reading, leaving comments, and leaving kudos. It helps me so much to keep the drive to write going.

Hux’s personal guard have all been briefed, training programmes assigned, and now he finds himself leading them to the omega in question, the awkward head of an awkward procession, the dislike of those that dislike him almost clouding the air in sense and scent behind him. It’s an uncomfortable feeling. Especially since he can feel that Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio still would like very much to kill him, even if the man will abstain from trying until he does something terrible to Hux. And the Lieutenant is convinced that it’s only a matter of time until he does do something terrible to Hux.

For once Hux greets him the moment he steps onto the bridge, the redhead like always ignoring all his usual hangers-on, but this time instead of waiting warily for him to approach, Hux comes up to him, the sour scent of unhappy omega hanging in a haze around the redhead. Has Hux found out what he did to that Captain? Is Hux angry? Did Hux have feelings for the alpha he killed? His own emotions are far too tangled for him to parse them right now. He feels blank. He watches the omega approach and feels blank. Not even the sight of the faint pinkness that is all that remains of the burn on Hux’s face makes him feel anything he can understand. 

Those pale eyes flick over the collection of alphas, betas and omegas behind him before Hux says, sounding earnest. ‘We need to talk, please follow me.’

‘Of course,’ he replies, falling into step behind the redhead. There’s a moment of confusion before Hux’s personal guard fall into step behind the both of them.

His General leads them back to the same old conference room as usual, gaze flickering back over the group following them. ‘Can they wait out here?’ Hux asks, voice perfectly polite. He can feel apprehension in the air, smell it in Hux’s scent. He can’t quite bring himself to reach out and probe too deeply into the redhead’s mind right now, afraid of what he’ll do if he makes even that sort of contact with the omega. Hux is beautiful, even looking exhausted and miserable Hux is beautiful. Why hasn’t he let himself acknowledge that before?

‘Of course,’ he repeats himself, gesturing for the guards to station themselves in protection of the room. He can see Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio longs to argue, can see the alpha almost insist that he be allowed to enter the room to guard Hux from what the man sees as the redhead’s biggest threat. Himself. But eventually the Lieutenant quietens, falls into place beside the door. 

Inside Hux gestures for him to sit down, and he does so, sinking into a black leather and chrome chair, and looking up at the redhead as his General fidgets for a moment before also taking a seat. He should ask Hux what’s wrong, but he’s almost afraid to hear the answer. ‘I—’ Hux says after a long moment, seeming very uncomfortable, mind radiating resignation, the need to appease. Alphas always ultimately need to be appeased. The danger that comes from not doing so. ‘Perhaps— Perhaps I did not handle things very well yesterday. I apologize if I caused offence.’

‘No!’ he snaps, before shaking his head, trying to shake himself into better behaviour. ‘No. I should apologize— not for assigning you those rooms or a personal guard!’ he’s quick to add the latter. ‘But I approached the situation without taking your feelings into account and then, when you didn’t respond the way I wanted you to, I forced the matter instead of discussing it.’

Hux seems stunned. The redhead sits there and stares at him for a long moment, long enough that temptation strikes, that he reaches out gently, oh-so gently, with the Force and brushes his mind against Hux’s. The redhead is surprised he apologized. Surprised in a good way. Now slightly confused as to how to proceed. 

Suddenly he’s remembering what that Captain from earlier said, insinuated, about what Hux might want. That Hux might want a mate. A mate like that. ‘An officer approached me earlier,’ he finds himself saying, ‘Wanting my permission to let him court you—’ he doesn’t know what to say beyond that.

There is a pause, the stink of misery and rotting water-blossoms suddenly so strong it makes him gag, makes him huff out a breath as though he can somehow expel the redhead’s distress from inside his body. ‘Please don’t make me,’ the redhead eventually says. Voice small.

Hux is a vision of despair, shoulders hunched, eyes averted, a flush, not just the pretty flush of an omega in heat, but an ugly, blotchy thing, suffusing his cheeks. _A brush against his mind and the world is a whirlpool of memories, Hux very young, surrounded by his father’s friends, older alphas or betas that stink like artificial alpha pheromones, and all their revolting comments, and the way they look at, the way they treat, the omegas they come into contact with. Their own mates. Their mistresses. And here a flash of a woman, a redheaded omega with looks like Hux’s, and frightened, always frightened, and the bruises on her face and her arms, and then the woman disappears under the memory of those alphas and those betas and the things they’d said, and the way they all tried to get Hux away from his father, away from prying eyes, and the way they’d try to lay hands on him. Innocent, some of them would say, just an innocent hand on his lower back leading him into a room, but he knew it wasn’t innocent. The things they said were never innocent. And no, he wouldn’t like to choke on their knot or gag for it or let them wreck him or tear his arse in two or get fat with their pups. And even the fact that every single one of them who spoke to him like that, or touched him, is now dead— he made sure they’re now dead— doesn’t wash away memory or the knowledge that in their eyes, in the eyes of so many, he’s not actually a person but a thing to possess—_

**Crack.** The shiny black surface of the table shatters. Hux startles, mind back to the here and now, hand going to his blaster, looking around for an enemy. 

He takes a deep breath. In. Out. In. ‘I killed him,’ he says, dark eyes meeting Hux’s pale ones. ‘The alpha. The officer. I killed him.’

He sees Hux take a deep breath. ‘Why?’

He wants to lie but he finds that he cannot. His mind is still trapped in Hux’s memories. In all that fear and all that disrespect. He does not want to disrespect Hux. ‘I seem to have developed romantic feelings for you.’

Everything seems to stop for a moment. Hux’s mind feels like static. Like a knife scraping down a sheet of metal. Metallic. The scent of blood. A rushing hiss like blood pumping hard in his ears.

Then the redhead blurts out a laugh, sounding utterly unamused. ‘No. No you haven’t.’

‘I _have_ ’ he insists. Humiliation beginning to gnaw at his mind. He forces it away. In truth he has no idea what he expected of Hux. Probably not this though. Probably not outright denial. 

‘How?’ the redhead asks, tone edging into hysteria. ‘You know nothing about me. We don’t even really talk. All you do is attack me, humiliate me, or order me around. How is that conducive to developing _romantic feelings?_ ’

‘I don’t know how, but I have,’ he replies, and maybe it’s the broken tone of his voice, his own helpless confusion slipping out into the air between them, but Hux seems to snap back to himself.

The redhead speaks after a moment’s thought, voice surprisingly calm. ‘If you do have such feelings then I doubt they’re truly romantic in nature. I’m in heat. You’re in rut. Don’t mistake whatever you feel for more than it is. Biology. It will go away once this is over.’

He shakes his head. ‘No. Or at least, I don’t think so. I feel—’ he rubs a hand roughly over his face. ‘I am sorry. Immeasurably sorry. For the way I have treated you. The things I’ve done. Said. The fact that I’ve hurt you, terrorised you. I wish very much that I’d been a different man.’

‘I can’t deal with this,’ the words slip out from between the redhead’s lips. Hux looks surprised, as if he didn’t mean to speak, but then forces himself to continue. ‘I don’t want to deal with this. There are more important things at hand—’ a breath and then in a moment of concession Hux adds ‘—if you still have _feelings_ when this crisis is over we can discuss them then.’

‘But—’ he begins, only to be interrupted. 

‘No _“buts”_ Ren! We have received a message about the Atmoscrub pheromone scrubbers. There has been an attack on their fleet of delivery vehicles. They are negotiating to borrow one for our shipment, but this may delay said shipment for up to a week.’

Still reeling from Hux’s dismissal of his feelings it takes a moment for his thoughts to catch up. ‘We’ve been doing alright, surely a week will make no real difference?’

An ugly expression crosses Hux’s face. He reaches out to the man’s mind, before pulling his awareness back. He doesn’t want to sense any contempt the redhead might feel towards him right now. ‘I had hoped that the scrubbers would arrive before this became an issue, but at the same time I am aware that I was being naïve. Realistically, even with new pheromone scrubbers installed it will take some time for this situation to abate— don’t get me wrong, they will be immensely useful in lessening the impact, in shortening heat and rut cycles, in allowing people to think more clearly— but they won’t stop a heat or rut cycle that is already underway. Everyone will just have to come out of season naturally—’ here Hux hesitates and he can feel the man’s apprehension without even having to touch his mind.

‘What is it?’ he asks.

The redhead grimaces. ‘I was hoping that we would have the new scrubbers installed before the first of the mated pairs comes out of season, but all my research suggests that will no longer be the case.’ The redhead takes a deep breath. ‘It is likely that once this happens our instincts, _yours_ and _mine_ , will no longer be shackled by our need to protect the pack. The pack will have plenty of mated pairs to keep everything safe, to defend the pack and ensure stability—’ Hux trails off.

‘What are you saying?’ he asks, even as he starts to get a dreadful suspicion. 

‘If we had new pheromone scrubbers installed we would be less vulnerable to the change in pheromones that will result from this, but as we don’t, I think that the both of us should be prepared for our symptoms to get worse. I feel it would be best for us to discuss who we feel we could conceivably leave in temporary command at the time— during which we should sequester ourselves in our own rooms—’ a pause, then Hux says ‘-or at least I intend to sequester myself. You may feel it would be better if you found a temporary rut companion to see you through.’

‘No!’ he snaps, attention on the last part. ‘I have no interest in anyone else.’ Then ‘What do you mean by our symptoms getting worse?’

‘Just what I said,’ there is frustration in Hux’s tone, but it doesn’t seem directed at him. ‘For you rut will be harder to ignore, for me heat. As I have said before we will not become mindless, but it will be much easier for our control to slip and the drive to— to—’ the smallest moment’s hesitation, a look of almost embarrassment on the redhead’s face ‘—in a normal pack facing this sort of situation either the Dominant Pair would go into season first and mate while the rest of the pack was devoted to protecting them, only really going into season once the Dominant Pair had recovered to take control of the situation, or the reverse. The Dominant Pair might only go into a light heat and rut until enough other pairs have recovered to protect the pack while they are otherwise occupied with the full force of their mating instincts. This seems to be what has happened in our case.’

He thinks about this for a moment. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

Hux huffs out an irritated breath. ‘Why do you think?’ a pause, Hux takes a deep breath, ‘Look— after this discussion—‘ The redhead sighs, scrubs a hand roughly over his face, ‘—Everything feels as if it’s gone too far. I don’t think I can play the role I’m supposed to right now. I don’t think I can, or want, to just creep around trying desperately not to upset you in case you _hurt_ me or kill someone. I won’t lie to you Ren. The truth is that I can’t even bring myself to pretend that I trust you. After everything that has happened I just didn’t know how you’d react to the knowledge. If you’d—’ Hux looks away.

‘What?’ he feels so very cold. He wishes Luke was here. ‘You thought I might—’ for a moment he’s going to use a metaphor, to talk around the issue, but he forces himself to say the actual words. ‘You thought I might what? Lose my temper? Kill you? Or, what, make use of you? Rape you?’

Stinking of saltwater Hux nods, unable to meet his eyes. ‘The former certainly. There have been times— I have done my best to remain strong in the face of your actions, but there have been times— You have broken my ribs, you have cracked my hyoid bone, torn soft tissue and cartilage, you have never shown any hesitation to just fling me around, to hurt me— As to the latter. I never thought it all that likely, but the thought still did cross my mind. Until this recent round of insanity I never believed you were capable of desiring me— but at the same time I know alphas don’t need to desire omegas to desire to make use of them, and I thought, considering our comparative statuses, that if you were going to make use of anyone I might seem an appropriate target.’

‘I’m sorry,’ is all he manages in response. Yes. A Monster. ‘I’m so very sorry.’

Hux looks at him for a long moment, before looking away. ‘You know I can’t even tell if you’re serious. If you mean it. Fuck, it feels mad to talk to you like this. I keep expecting you to attack.’

‘I won’t’ he yelps out. ‘I promise. Never again. I won’t. I won’t.’

The thought crossed Hux’s mind so loudly he can’t ignore it. _”You sound like my father”_ and with it the image of a man, older, red hair turning silver, clinging around the waist of the omega from Hux’s memories earlier, the woman who looks so much like Hux. The man is mewling apologies. The woman’s face is swollen, purpling, bruised. Her eyes almost empty as she stares straight ahead. 

He could scream. He could cry. He could vomit. It won’t change anything. That is the kind of man Hux sees him as. ‘I need to go,’ he manages to say. ‘I need to think. Please, I know I handled it badly, but please let your guards protect you. I’m sorry. I am. I need to—’

‘Ok,’ Hux says after a moment. ‘We’ll discuss arrangements for command of the fleet while we’re out of commission later.’

‘I don’t—’ he mutters, scrubbing his hands across his face again. His thoughts are spiralling. The Dark Side tempts him. He could pull this ship down around the two of them. Destroy it all. Destroy himself. Destroy everything. The First Order. End it all. Kill the part of Hux that sees him like that. _A monster._

‘ _Ren!_ Hux’s sharp voice lances through his spiralling thoughts. He looks over, meets those pale eyes. ‘It is not the end of the world. If you are sorry simply do better in the future. Learn from your mistakes.’

‘If I do will you forgive me?’ he asks, but he doesn’t sound like him. He sounds like Ben. Lost and lonely, sad and pathetic. 

Hux glances away, then meets his eyes. ‘I don’t know. I’m not going to make you any promises, I don’t think that would be fair to either of us, but the only way either of us can find out is if you try.’

‘Try,’ he repeats. ‘Yes. I will. Try.’

‘Ok then,’ Hux says with a nod. ‘We will talk again later.’

‘Yes, later,’ he says, nodding in return. 

He feels empty, dazed, as he leaves the room past Hux’s suspicious guards. He needs to think. Think about everything. Instinctively he heads towards his training rooms. A bit of violence should help clear his mind.


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you're all doing well- not sure about this chapter, it didn't quite feel like it was coalescing. I hope you all think it's ok. 
> 
> Thank you all, as always, for reading, leaving comments, leaving kudos! You really are a wonderful audience and I love reading your reactions to each chapter as I post them.

Later he stands panting in his training rooms surrounded by the shattered remains of the last of his training droids. His knuckles are skinned. His face is bruised. His ribs are bruised. He didn’t even use the Force. He’s not sure if the training droids are salvageable. He may have to ask Hux to order in some more. Yet more guilt. He needs some space, some time away from the redhead to get control of himself, to work out what he wants to do about his feelings.

So, he spends the next couple of days avoiding Hux, spending time in his rooms, spending time training Hux’s personal guard, spending time organising a uniform for them, even spending time, time he’s not sure he wants to spend, planning how to build a better nest. It’s a distraction, nothing more. He certainly has no expectation of ever showing it to Hux. Still, he uses the idea of Hux, his notion of Hux’s standards, to help him plan it, and the image of Hux, pale and pretty and all _his_ floats through his mind as he creeps through the storage decks of the ships of the fleet gathering supplies. 

During these days his mind cycles over his last interaction with his General, the things he’s said, the things Hux had said, the redhead’s memories, terrible memories. For some strange reason out of all the horribleness of it all his mind keeps getting stuck on Hux saying that he knows nothing about the omega. It’s not quite true, he knows little things, he knows Hux is hard working, a perfectionist, ruthless, brilliant, non-compliant unless he feels he has no other option, and that Snoke had called him a “rabid cur.” He has no idea what Hux’s favourite colour is, his favourite food, what he does in his down time, what he thinks about so many things— Perhaps the redhead was right to feel so much disbelief in the face of his confession. Still, as Hux said, he should _simply do better in the future._

Eventually he decides he’s been coward enough so he returns to the bridge, eager eyes taking in Hux’s slender form, a soft pleasure suffusing him to see the last of the burn has finally faded. Hux is unmarked now, unbruised, unburnt, no longer carrying the evidence of his bad deeds on that pretty face. 

Nearby the redhead are FN-2037 and Ensign Uskais, his General’s two guards for the moment. The lot of them take shifts in pairs so every one of them has adequate time to train and rest to be at their best to protect the omega. When they’re not on duty he has been working on their training, training together with them— has spent quite a lot of his time doing it during all these days he has been hiding from Hux. It is funny, for all his shame about so many things he is still pleased with his choices for Hux’s guard. In truth, as he gets to know them, he is more pleased with them than he was even at the start. 

As fighters they are progressing nicely, and he finds himself enjoying developing training programmes customised to each’s strengths and weaknesses. It’s a kind of responsibility he’s never had in the past and oddly finds himself good at. If only it could all be so easy— for all their strengths group cohesiveness remains a decided weakness. 

For the most part he keeps FN-1905 and FN-1923 on duty together; as mates, and long-term mates at that, they work well together, almost as if they can read each other’s minds to become one animal, savage in its intensity, brilliant in its focus. But if he needs them to work with others— then there’s sometimes a problem. They get on well with the practical, sensible Lieutenant Uskais, but surprisingly seem to have more trouble with FN-0954 even though she is a female omega— though perhaps that has more to do with her obvious confusion and occasional insensitive question about why they would even want to be mated in the first place. As far as the male-bodied Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio and FN-2037 go— the two women are always at least mildly hostile, and hostile in a way that’s hard for anyone to ignore. It offends the Lieutenant, and FN-2037 just assumes that it’s because of his sexuality and thus makes little attempt to bond with them in turn.

It’s not helped that Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio is stand-offish with everyone— though a quick perusal of the man’s mind is enough to prove that this originates more in a kind of shyness that makes him cling to rules and protocol and formal distance between himself and others instead of stemming from some sort of superiority complex, but the other members of Hux’s guard can’t read the alpha’s mind the way he can, so the Lieutenant just comes off as prissy and unapproachable. 

FN-2037, on the other-hand, is not by nature as withdrawn as he acts, or at least that’s what he suspects from contact with the man’s mind— though he sometimes suspects he shouldn’t spend too much time getting too close to the beta. He’s confused enough as it is. The Stormtrooper is a surprisingly attractive man under his armour— attractive, _sexy,_ in a slender, lithe way, with his dark eyes and white-milk and Kaf complexion, and a slightly cold and haughty way of holding himself that reminds him very much of Hux— attractive enough to make him wonder if he would have eventually added an attraction to specific male-bodied betas to his sexuality if he’d never come to his senses and realised that there is no person in this galaxy as attractive and desirable as his General. _Fuck. Is that true? What about Rey— it must be rut. Is it rut? He thinks of Rey and his dick twitches, he thinks of Hux and it swells to fullness._ FN-2037 is intense, and angry, and an absolutely, delightfully, _vicious_ fighter— but he also doesn’t trust easily or anyone and seems to be waiting for word to get around about his ex and sexuality and for a new round of torments to begin from the rest of Hux’s guard. 

Then there’s FN-0954— who may be trying her best, but her best doesn’t change the fact that she is occasionally amazingly, awe-inspiringly insensitive. It is something positive that her tactlessness is combined with a willingness to work hard and to do her best to integrate with whoever she’s working with, and he’s pleased that as the days pass everyone does seem to be getting easier in her company and she herself is beginning to have some sense of where her comrades’ boundaries are. Mainly because none of them aside from FN-2037 have shown the slightest hesitation to tell her when she’s transgressed them, a thing she finds remarkably helpful, instead of the usual way people just get annoyed with her and not tell her they are in favour of treating her differently than they have in the past. They still confuse her though— even as she’s learning to accept being told to stop whatever she’s doing that is offending people even if they refuse to explain it to her— she is also somewhat learning not to spend the next entirely-too-long-until-he-has-no-choice-but-to-tell-everyone-off arguing with whatever explanation they might give if they do give one. So, progress of a type there. 

Lieutenant Uskais is a delight though. An absolute delight. Calm. Sensible. Competent. Patient. Not prone to emotional outbursts. Un-traumatised by her sexuality. Un-judgemental of others’ sexualities. Unbiased against any gender. Willing to work with anyone. A good fighter who is improving in leaps and bounds. Not ego-driven. An absolute delight. He nods at the woman and she nods back, respectful as always. 

‘Supreme Leader,’ Hux acknowledges, smelling and feeling apprehensive, but at the same time strangely determined to give him— not so much the benefit of the doubt, but to try not to make too many assumptions about his behaviour and just see what happens. It’s a very generous decision. He feels an upwelling of affection, sudden and unanticipated, even though he tells himself that the redhead is probably only acting this way out of complete fatigue at having to anticipate what he’ll do next. Guilt, like always, walks with him. 

‘General Hux,’ he acknowledges, eyes taking in that pretty form. Hux seems as exhausted as ever, actually looks like he may have gotten thinner. 

Quietly, so the only ones that can overhear are Hux’s guards, he says. ‘I have been thinking on what you said, all of what you said, but particularly that I don’t know you. I would like to change that, if you don’t mind?’

Hux takes a moment to think, and it’s tempting like always to simply reach into the redhead’s mind and read his thoughts, but he is determined to treat Hux with more respect. Hopefully this time the determination will last. ‘Alright,’ the redhead says after a moment. ‘How do you intend to do this?’

He knows Hux will not appreciate him hanging around while the redhead is working any more than Hux appreciates any alpha doing the same, and he does want so badly to respect the redhead’s desires, so, ‘I was thinking we could take our meals together, as well as spending some time in evenings talking.’

‘I suppose that is acceptable,’ Hux says, giving him an odd look. ‘We do need to discuss our contingency plans anyway.’

He nods. ‘Of course.’ A moment’s thoughts and then he asks, ‘Would you like to take lunch in the Mess Hall or somewhere more private?’ other people he will just have to deal with it. He will. That resentment he can feel perking up at the back of his mind can just fuck off. 

‘Perhaps the conference room?’ Hux suggests after a moment. ‘I have had the table replaced,’ and that, right there, is possibly actually a smile. Is it a fond smile? An amused smile? It doesn’t seem a contemptuous one—

‘Of course,’ he replies with a rather ungainly and abrupt nod. ‘I will meet you there.’

He does. They sit, they order food, at first things are awkward, terribly awkward, and they’ve each eaten half of their meal before he manages to make himself ask about Hux’s favourite food. A topic that seems appropriate given what they’re doing. So Hux tells him of a life spent for the most part eating rations, where food is more about survival than pleasure, but then there’s a pause, the redhead looking at him assessing, and even though he’s trying not to read the omega’s mind, he can feel the swoop, something like the floor dropping out from under the omega, as his General obviously makes some decision. A decision he’s not privy to. It may have something to do with exactly how much the redhead is willing to share with him because when Hux resumes speaking he talks about memories of food from his childhood— and here the omega goes sad and quiet for a moment and he feels guilty, always guilty, but guilty this time for encouraging the redhead to speak of something that obviously hurts him, but the redhead shakes it off— and talks of things he’s eaten at various functions and the extremely few times he’s been stuck planetside and anonymous and has gone to little out-of-the-way restaurants or street carts and eaten the most delicious food. Curries of spiced fish, flame grilled poultry on sticks with salty/sweet/spicy sauces, savoury pastries stuffed with meat or vegetables or even sweet fruit, candied nuts eaten from carts, little cakes in the shape of local animals stuffed with sweet fillings the redhead didn’t recognise and couldn’t even guess at the ingredients of—

As the omega talks it’s almost as if he is transported into the experience, the detailed, vivid worlds Hux weaves for him, and he thinks it odd to look at Hux, so stuffy, so uptight in appearance, and imagine a younger man wandering some foreign world by himself, drinking the local liquor and nibbling on the local street cuisine. At the end, once Hux’s done talking, the man actually asks him about himself, more than he could have ever expected, and even though he doesn’t know if his General really wants to know or is just trying to appease him he finds he’s got his own narrative to tell, his own history with food to impart on the attentive redhead. 

There is no way for him to talk about food without talking about his mother, Luke. He doesn’t mean to. He starts out talking about how he can’t stop craving red meat ever since he’s been in rut— and even mentioning it brings forth visions of hunting, killing, bringing the kill back for Hux to feast on— but somehow talking about meat leads in to a mention of missing the stew his uncle used to cook, which leads to talking about how often they’d all eat together before he went to the temple, all four of them, his parents and Luke and him, and how neither of his parents could cook, and how dismissive his father would get of anyone trying, and how Luke eventually got sick of them always ordering in food whenever he came over, and eventually he started cooking, even though at the beginning all he could prepare was pretty basic, subsistence fare from Tattooine, but how over the years his uncle had gotten better and better at it, and how his parents, both of them, would hang all over Luke while he prepared the food. Always touching him. Almost worshipful. Like they were waiting for him to bequeath them with some great gift instead of a haunch of roasted bovine. Like they both wanted so much to wrap their whole worlds around him, make him the centre of everything, but couldn’t quite bring themselves to do it. 

Then, after he went to the temple— or maybe he should say after Luke decided to turn his little side-project of research into Jedi history and experiments to improve his relationship with the Force into a proper teaching temple in response to _his_ strength and inability to control his own relationship with the Force— everything started to change. His father was angry for some obscure reason. His mother became quiet— _There are things about their relationship, the relationship of the three of them, he hadn’t understood or tried to ignore as a child, but it’s harder to do so looking back— he doesn’t mention it to Hux though, or the way it makes him feel. The anger there. Anger at his father above the other two_ — The dinners quickly became fewer and fewer, his mother trying to schedule them at first to ensure they were least weekly or bi-weekly, but then everyone got busier and their plans started to fall through and so often Luke would smell sad, like saltwater—because even though his uncle was on heat suppressants he was allergic to every type of scent suppressants he’d ever tried, so you could always smell how he felt about everything— until Luke noticed anyone watching, and then he’d do his best to seem his usual optimistic self. Still, even though his parents were rarely around, Luke cooked for his students, less elaborate dishes, more of the type to stretch further with fewer ingredients, but the food was good, and watching them all eat and enjoy it always made his uncle smell like a happy omega. He wonders what Hux would smell like happy. He hasn’t had the experience since the pheromone scrubbers failed— not surprising. The redhead has never seemed purely, unambiguously happy in all the years he’s known him. 

At the end of his ramble he realises he’s gotten far off the point of what his favourite foods are, but Hux doesn’t seem to mind. The redhead looks thoughtful and then asks him something that he doesn’t really want to have to answer. ‘What happened? How did you end up with Snoke?’

_A memory of Luke standing over him, lightsabre in hand. The man that he knew not there, a stranger in place of his uncle— always so kind to him, always so good, patient, gentle, even after he’d withdrawn after that moment, that horrible, embarrassing moment. Fear swells and he grabs for the Force, uses it to soothe himself until he can think again. How can he explain what happened to Hux? How can he explain it to himself if he actually thinks about it? —and he has done his best not to think about it over the years. Luke hadn’t felt like Luke, hadn’t even really smelt like Luke, and his whole hut had been so filled with the Dark Side, had reeked of it, cold and metallic, and it had felt like his bones themselves had shaken in his flesh—_

‘Something happened,’ he says after a while, and hears Ben’s voice once more creeping out, ‘But I don’t know how to talk about it right now, is that alright?’

‘Of course,’ Hux says and he doesn’t even get the impression the man is angry with him, frustrated with him for not talking about it, the way his mother used to get when he didn’t know how express what was bothering him. It’s lovely. Hux is kinder than he ever could have imagined.


	17. Chapter 17

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNING: None of the active characters get raped in this chapter, but there are mentions of Hux witnessing omegas being drugged, assaulted, and having their bodily autonomy violated in the past, as well as sexual harassment he himself experienced when he was younger. There is also some mention of birth control and abortion in this chapter.
> 
> Thank you all so much for reading, commenting and leaving kudos! I hope you're all well. I have been fighting off a cold... but at least it is a very mild one!

They meet up again for dinner. This time he asks Hux’s favourite colour, even though it’s a childish question, and after a moment in which Hux seems to be assessing whether he feels safe talking about it the redhead tells him that it’s the blue/green colour of the seas and the sky of Arkanis, where he was born. When Hux asks the question in return all he can say is that he doesn’t know. Red perhaps, but red feels a bit spoiled for him after Crait. Black— but that’s a clichéd answer, the answer the him that had left the temple in smoke and ruins would have given. Right now he likes copper, the red-pink-orange colour of Hux’s hair, but he’s not sure he should admit that, so in the end he mainly shrugs helplessly, and they let it go at that. The inability to answer leaves him feeling oddly empty. As if parts of him have atrophied in all the years he spent as Snoke’s apprentice. Creature. Slave. 

Since the need is pressing they talk for a while about who they can entrust the fleet to if Hux’s predictions do come to pass. In his case he has no suggestions, no loyalty, and even though Hux brings up some of his own, Captain Phasma, a Lieutenant named Mitaka— though the latter is prefaced with Hux’s worry that since he is one of the redhead’s closest and most trusted omegas and hasn’t given in to heat yet either there is a real chance he may go out properly in sympathy with Hux. That, whether acknowledged or not, he may actually be a Secondary Omega, part of the pack’s Inner Court, an old-fashioned notion that encompasses the ones always in closest sympathy to the Dominant Pair— in the end what they really discuss is his own lack of connection to the pack. 

He was always Snoke’s animal, always separate, never part of the rank and file. They both know he didn’t grow up as a member of the First Order, but it’s more than that. He has no real loyalties, no close bonds, no Secondary Alphas or Betas that he can rely on, no attachments. He is functionally the Dominant Alpha of a pack he does not care about. He could kill any of them without hesitation and with no lingering guilt after. He has killed them in the past, indiscriminately. For the first time he finds himself contemplating how wrong that is. 

Hearing the fact that he really has no place here is confronting. Rage rises, but he pushes it back down. He can’t deny it. He can’t do anything about the look that Hux gets on his face, the way the redhead ruefully shakes his head, and, when pressed, eventually admits that all things considered it’s no surprise that their pack is so unhealthy, that everyone went into season the way they have instead of just accepting an easy transition of Dominant Alphas. If he had connections with the pack, their loyalty, their respect, Snoke may have been overthrown without such consequences. Afterwards Hux goes quiet, wary, as if expecting punishment. He feels tired, the rage draining away. All he can do is concede that the redhead is right, but at the same time he doesn’t know what to do about it. 

‘From everything I’ve read the best advice I can give would be to spend more time with the pack instead of in your own rooms,’ Hux says, looking thoughtful, ‘Eat with them, train with them, engage in training exercises with them without actually killing them— if we weren’t stuck onboard I would even suggest going planetside with groups of them to collect resources. Hunting together, eating together, fighting together are usually considered basic ways to induce pack bonding and are a quintessential part of Stormtrooper training.’

‘I don’t want to eat with them, I want to eat with you,’ he— well, he whines. There’s no point pretending it’s anything else. 

In the end they decide he’ll eat breakfast in the Mess Hall sitting amongst the pack, eat lunch in the Mess Hall sitting with Hux and discussing whatever they have to discuss that any random member of the pack may be permitted to overhear, and spend the evening meals and time after dinner together. It feels like a loss, so soon after gaining the privilege of spending all that time just with Hux, but the redhead looks and smells and sounds and feels so pleased when he agrees that he can’t bring himself to go back on it —It’s not like he didn’t know, but the fact that the First Order is important to the redhead seems suddenly relevant. Something to bear in mind. Something to impact on his own behaviour if he wants to win the omega— _why is he thinking like that? He’s just getting to know Hux, that’s all_ — that’s all for now. Is he really going to pretend that getting to know Hux will be enough in the long run? When has he ever backed down from pursuing something he really, truly wants?—

So he eats in the Mess Hall for breakfast and lunch, and at lunch he talks to Hux about lighter topics like music, dramas they’ve seen, books they’ve read, planets they’ve visited, and he spends more time outside his rooms, he walks the halls and lets himself be seen, he trains a little bit in both the soldiers and officers training rooms with the soldiers and officers, as well as in his own— by himself and with Hux’s Personal Guard, and in the evening he and Hux retire to the conference room and talk about the more serious things, or even things that don’t seem like they will become serious, but by being alone the more serious elements of the conversation are allowed the room to surface. 

The second night they start out talking about alcohol, him remembering Hux’s description of drinking as he wandered distant planets. They’re both drinking wine, a heavy and slightly metallic red, even though neither of them really likes wine, as they soon discover. They’ll both drink it because they were raised in the kind of households that do, and have both had their share of awkward formal occasions where it would be rude not to, but he doesn’t drink much more than a glass or two every now and then because it impacts on his control of the Force and when he does want to drink more he has a bad habit of drinking the strongest stuff he can find and drinking himself into oblivion— like right after he left the temple—even though he was underage, still a child, but now one without anyone who truly cared for him— of course Snoke did nothing to stop him from drinking himself to miserable, destructive incoherence night and day, until he’d eventually challenged the alpha, had the everloving shit beaten out of him, then been locked up in a small, dark room by himself for almost a month until he’d well and truly sobered up— and since then done his best to remain sober. With the occasional failure, of course. 

The looks Hux gives him after that story contains actual, visible sympathy. Maybe he shouldn’t have told the redhead. The man he thinks of himself as would never tell anyone— he can’t imagine telling Rey, the way she’d look at him— and he doesn’t know what idea is worse, her pity or her disgust, but he wants Hux. He wants Hux so badly. He spends his nights trying to knot his berth and by now he’s given up pretending the pale nape and the long legs and narrow waist and red mouth and coppery hair than fly through his fantasies belong to anyone other than the omega. So, if he wants Hux he might just have to be honest with Hux. Let Hux get to know him the way he is getting to know the redhead. 

Maybe his own honesty is for the best, because then he has his own turn at sympathy when Hux speaks, voice halting, faltering a little, about his father’s friends always trying to get him to drink more than he wanted to, even when he was actually a child and shouldn’t have been drinking at all, always trying to force glass after glass on him— and here Hux tells him what he already knows, what he already saw in the omega’s mind about the inappropriate behaviour he’d experienced when he was younger— and then the redhead laughs a little, ruefully, and says ‘You know you’re the first person I have ever told— I’m not even sure why I did. Maybe it’s because I want you to understand why, even if you hadn’t done all the things you have, I probably wouldn’t have met your confession with a lot of trust.’ A sour twist of the redhead’s mouth, something like the expectation of rejection cast over his thoughts and anger that he even feels that way, and it’s too hard not to touch that bright, shining mind, but he promises himself he won’t push too deep. ‘Sorry,’ Hux says, proud and defensive and lovely, ‘You did say you want to get to know me.’

‘I’m not like that, I promise,’ he swears, trying to meet Hux’s pale eyes, averted to the side and glancing back into the past. ‘I have never, in all of my life, done anything like that. I’m not that kind of alpha.’ 

Hux snorts out a laugh. ‘I’m not actually sure how many of them were even alphas in the first place. My father, his friends, all of them, they all constantly stank of artificial alpha pheromones and hormones, the kind of nose-burning, dodgy black market stuff used that those who can’t pass the screening tests for access to proper hormone therapy, or can’t find a doctor or medidroid corruptible enough to pass them even if all the screening tests say they want to be alphas because they want the status and social power and not because they were born alphas but biology made a mistake somewhere along the line. Even the ones I knew for sure were alphas were on it— all of them, betas and alphas, trying to smell like top dog, like a Dominant Alpha and not some bottom of the hierarchy grunt. Insecurity. I imagine.’ 

He knows the kind of man Hux is talking about. They’ve always made him feel small, ugly and awkward, and angry. Always so angry. Men like that— there are a lot of them he’s killed over the years— he tries to remember if any of them smelled off, wrong, but his past is one all too often trapped behind his helmet, pheromone scrubbers in place. He does have a faint memory of his mother talking about black-market synthetic alpha hormones at some point, the fact that they were illegal, but the ban was hard to enforce because society as a whole seemed to want to be an alpha. And the side effects, he remembers wondering why anyone would ever take them as she’d listed them all off. He doesn’t remember every one now, but he does remember something about increased aggression, almost uncontrollable sex-drive, decreased capacity for empathy, increased risk of criminal offending, increased risk of certain neurological disorders— in particular some forms of dementia, as well as high blood pressure, heart attack, stroke, diabetes, and in general a higher mortality rate. 

‘I am glad they’re all dead,’ an understatement, but what can he say? He knows from Hux’s memories that the readhead is the direct cause of most of those deaths, and he’s not sure if Hux would welcome being told that he’d gladly resurrect them if he could and rip their bodies and their minds apart shred by shred while making sure they felt the agony of every moment. ‘Your father allowed it?

Hux shakes his head, a little bleary from the wine. ‘No. They kept it away from Brendol. He was so ashamed I was an omega. He bred with my mother even though he already had a wife— Maratelle— a beta that he made miserable, absolutely miserable, and boy did she like to spread that misery around— hoping to gain himself a good little alpha boy, exactly the kind of man he couldn’t be himself. You know he had me on suppressants even before I hit puberty?’

‘That can’t be healthy.’ Fear. He remembers public service announcements about the appropriate age to be put of suppressants. His parents, Luke’s, concern when he’d demanded a rut-suppressant implant before he’d even been in rut for the first time— but he’d had his reasons. His sad and faded and still strangely lovely uncle. Not as lovely as— His gaze roams over Hux, trying to see what damage may have been done. ‘Is he dead?’ If he’s not he soon will be. Rage bubbles up in him, dark and killing. He leans into it, lets the Dark Side embrace his mind, soothe him. 

‘Oh yes,’ Hux waves off his concern. ‘I killed him ages ago. I didn’t even grieve; what kind of omega does that make me?’ before he can answer with “A perfectly sane and reasonable one” Hux is saying ‘I did get myself checked out once I got out from under his control. No lasting damage, surprisingly. I mean, there was some suggestion that my height and un-omega-like figure might have something to do with it, but otherwise I am apparently perfectly reproductively healthy.’

He begins with, ‘You’ve hardly got an un-omega-like figure—' a little bleary himself, and maybe they’ve drunk a little more than they should but it feels easy between them right now, comfortable— and then the thought marches rudely across his mind that if so much of the pack is in heat surely that will result in pregnancies. A lot of pregnancies. ‘What about the babies!’ is what he blurts out, but once he’s managed to make Hux understand this most recent bit of imperfect communication the redhead reassures him that it is very unlikely that many, if any, pregnancies will result, as standard First Order protocols recommend— unless there is a particular health reason that it is inappropriate in an individual case— the use of a tripartite system of separate scent suppressants, heat or rut suppressants, and birth control— the latter applicable for males and females of all three sub-genders. Such a system is less likely to result in the failure of birth control in the event of a failure of scent, heat and rut suppressants. 

Hux’s reasoning, when the redhead gives it, is— horrible. Depressing. Angering. The only way to think about it when he thinks back on it is with as much objectivity as possible and with the tightest grip on the Force that he can manage. His General has, as a child, witnessed members of his father’s set lace the drinks or food of omegas with heat inducing drugs that not only counteract heat suppressants but will induce heat within roughly two hours. This didn’t always end as the betas and alphas in question desired, as once in heat an omega’s instincts are roused, and what they are often roused to do in such a situation is defend themselves tooth and claw, but sometimes there were other drugs in there with the heat inducers, drugs to induce more compliance in the omegas, and those drugs and what happened to the omegas that ingested them is a thing that still terrifies Hux. There were pregnancies resulting in some cases, heat inducers working to also counteract birth control in most commonly used combined systems. Hux had sworn that if it ever happened to him there would be no baby, no hijack of his body in such a way, even if only for the time between conception and his realisation and its removal, so the redhead had researched the best combination of birth control and suppressants to ensure that even if the suppressants failed the birth control would not. That’s now the standard for the entire First Order. 

That night he’s furious. He beats his knuckles bloody, broken, on the wall of his training room. His mind keeps catching on the way he used to think. The way he’s always felt about omegas. Like they were lesser. Like they were nothing. And he can’t explain it, can’t justify it anymore. He doesn’t even know why he thought like that. He is a monster.


	18. Chapter 18

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok, so this chapter is lousy with world building and ruminations on pornography again. Sorry. 
> 
> I hope you have all been having a good week, and as usual please allow me to thank you for reading, leaving comments, and kudos.

Eventually he skulks off to the medbay to get his hand fixed once more and to get a nasty lecture from a very unimpressed medidroid, passing by a sleeping Phasma, that little red cat curled up by her side. Once the medidroid is done with him he leaves the private cubicle to discover Hux, red cat in his arms, Phasma awake and the two conversing quietly. They look up at his arrival, his General’s arms tightening reflexively, protectively, around the cat. The cat seems oddly ok with this, from what he knows of cats, obviously happy to be in its, _her,_ owner’s arms. 

It takes him a moment to remember, but then he asks, ‘Her name is Millicent, isn’t it?’ as he carefully approaches. Hux nods, a little jerky, scent a little sour, stressed, afraid for his pet. A delicate brush of the redhead’s mind confirms this. ‘May I pet her?’ he asks after a moment. She does seem a very cute cat. Small, built on delicate lines—like her owner— and with eyes that are watching him with wary contempt. Also, quite often in the past, like her owner.

_”If you hurt her, I will die making sure your end is nothing more than the most exquisite agony this Universe can bring forth,”_ loudly crosses the surface of the redhead’s mind. He feels his dick twitch, though fail to get hard. Snorts a breath of confusion. Surely he should find such thoughts offensive— but Hux with the cat in his arms, the cat cradled so protectively— like a baby. Like one of their pups would be— and with all that rage and determination to protect the little thing— fuck. Hux would make an excellent mother. It’s such a paralyzingly arousing thought. ‘If you’re _gentle,_ ’ is what the redhead actually says. 

Feeling a little dazed he extends a hand, careful, careful— only to have it batted away by a clawed paw accompanied by a quick puff of a hiss. Hux steps backwards immediately, eyes on him, wariness increasing.

‘It’s ok,’ he reassures his redhead, still feeling kind of brainless and hopelessly infatuated. ‘She doesn’t know me. She’s got no reason to trust me.’ He extends a hand again, leaving it hanging in mid-air, close enough that the cat can sniff him if she wants to. 

They watch her, waiting to see what she does, his own breath catching in his throat as she delicately extends her head to sniff at his fingers before retreating back to sit smug in her owner’s arms. Somehow his eyes catch Phasma’s. She seems very, very amused. A brush of her mind— to her eyes and her nose he’s pretty much screaming his intention to court Hux. No surprise as far as she can see. Then her eyes harden and, almost as if she is trying to project the thought at him, comes the notion that _If he hurts the redhead she will kill him, even if she dies in the process._

Maybe she’d be right to. He won’t though, he will not be that sort of man, that sort of alpha— he can’t tell her that though. She’d never believe him. It’s all he can do to keep believing it himself— he knows all too well that he has hurt Hux in the past. He has to believe it though, he has to put all his faith in it, he has to bring it to pass. 

It’s hard to sleep that night, even after exhausting himself, even after hurting himself, even after seeing Hux and the redhead’s cat. What he learnt from Hux hurts where it sits in his mind, and he’s frustrated, the people who hurt his omega already dead so he can’t even rip them apart, and rut is gnawing on him— he goes looking for porn again. He’s not proud that this time he searches through the collection of _reuploads for real alphas_ for a tall, skinny male omega who is definitely a redhead. He doesn’t even pick one in which the omega does much. The man doesn’t finger himself, fuck himself, fist himself, simply rolls around naked in a well-constructed nest seeming pleased and happy and comfortable. He comes so hard he worries he’s gone cross-eyed.

His own practice nest has become inarguably revolting by now, stinking, stained with come— and spit where his dreams have led him to bite at the padding or the walls, a long pale nape always in mind. In the morning he will tell the cleaning droids to disassemble it and clean everything. The next nest he makes— he suspects it won’t exactly be a practice nest. It probably won’t be the final version that he will show Hux— if he ever shows Hux a nest, but it’s time to stop fucking around and take this seriously. He wants to court Hux. He wants Hux to be his mate. _What he wants he gets._

That night though, still lounging in the sticky mess of a thing, he ends up reading the comments again, all those pleased alphas, all that anger towards anything beta that shows up. He remembers Hux’s memories, what the redhead had said about his father, his father’s friends. Ends up leaving the porn database to go looking up how common it is for betas to try and emulate alphas. It turns out it’s pretty common. Somehow he ends up on this message-board for self-professed _real alphas_ — which is not what he would have expected if he heard someone use the term “real alpha.” 

He would have expected a “real alpha” to be something like the alphas he has seen in alpha/omega porn, but a good third of all posts on the message-board seem to be complaints about alpha/omega porn. It’s a lot to take in all at once, and it’s all so obviously biased, trying to push a narrative of what it is to be an alpha, that he doesn’t know what he feels about it. 

He starts by focussing on what he wanted to know to begin with— betas emulating alphas. There is a lot of anger there towards so-called “mock alphas” who seem to act pretty much exactly like what Hux remembered and described, like a mockery of what it is to be a “real alpha”, all violence and sexual aggression and mistreatment of omegas, while on the other hand a “real alpha” almost worships omegas, listens to them, values them, and exists in a pack where omegas, and not just alphas, are represented and respected on every level of the hierarchy. This anger towards “mock alphas” is universal, though especially strong from a couple of individuals who he quickly learns are trans-alphas (he also learns that for trans-alphas, trans-omegas, and even _trans-betas_ hormones and other therapies are widely and easily available on most worlds for anyone who has passed the easy to pass screening tests) who feel that “mock alphas” delegitimise their own experiences. In amongst all the rage and pain and confusion, so much of it like his own, that he encounters he learns that as far as these “real alphas” are concerned it is beta society that has defined much of what it means to be an alpha (and an omega)— often to the detriment of both alphas and omegas. 

Betas make up the majority of any human population, usually about eighty percent, though on some worlds and in some organisations— here military organisations in particular are singled out— that percentage can drop closer to sixty. He himself knows from the recent situation that just over forty one percent of the crew of the fleet are alphas or omegas, which is quite a high proportion, but one that tallies with the reported fact that alphas and _omegas_ — not just alphas, as is widely considered to be true— are attracted to situations where they have a more defined pack— like a military organisation, a small colony, long term service aboard a ship with a fairly restricted crew, as well as roles that promote the welfare of the pack — particularly through offence or defence. Since the First Order has (under Hux), as far he knows, no restrictions on service for alphas or omegas, or any restriction on the gender of those enrolled into the Stormtrooper programme, the ranks of those in active service have naturally swelled with those genders. 

Because the interests of alphas and omegas naturally lie more in benefiting the pack— in military service, in medical or scientific occupations, in welfare programmes, in certain types of politics— though quite often alpha or omega politicians are more focussed on policy than accruing power and are thus easily done over (his mind goes to what he knows of his grandmother, Padma Amidala. It’s not much. Most of it reconstructed by his mother and Luke long after the fact, based on incredibly incomplete records and Empire propaganda, but she seems to have been just such an omega.)— it is often betas that are in charge of the occupations that make culture. Particularly professions that require a great deal of squabbling for imperfectly defined status, where an individual may rise and fall in a matter of days, where duplicitous and underhanded dealings come naturally, and where it is beneficial to have a scent that is weaker, a capacity to scent others that is weaker, a weaker instinctual reaction to scents, and in some cases even have the capacity to emit deceptive scents contrary to their own emotional state. In other words, betas thrive in the entertainment industry, they thrive in general politics, and they thrive in business and marketing, and as such they have constructed much of what everyone consumes about how the world is supposed to work— often based on their own dodgy and unscientific understanding of the roles of the sexes.

In their eyes alphas are beta males taken to the extreme, just as omegas are beta females taken to the extreme. Except even the traits they lay at their own doors, the traits of beta males and beta females, don’t always prove true under scrutiny— he thinks for a moment of his mother, Rey, Ensign Uskais— their competency, their practical natures, their various proficiencies in a fight— none of them are anything like the stereotype of beta femininity— stupid, overly emotional, passive, manipulative, insecure. 

There are a lot of complaints on the message-board about the depiction of alphas and omegas in works of fiction, particularly the negative reaction seen by most of the beta audience when they are written realistically. Betas do not like seeing omegas leading a pack, betas do not like seeing omegas as confident, competent, intelligent, and especially not as independent. “Real Alphas” disagree. “Real Alphas” love strong, smart, competent omegas. Betas like omegas in heat to be total slaves to their instincts, unable to say “no,” totally helpless, and they especially like story lines where omegas are raped—or almost raped— only to be saved and avenged by their “true mate.” —A fancy of beta storytelling. There is no such thing as a “true mate,” once mated alphas and omegas will remain so until one dies or one or both (or more, in the case of triads or groups) lose interest, then they’ll simply stop emitting mated pheromones and have the option of finding a new mate, or recompeting to regain their mate’s interest if it’s a one-sided waning of affection— “Real alphas” like storylines where uppity betas or alphas try it on with an omega in heat and get the everloving shit beaten out of them. They like aggressive omegas. Protective omegas. Omegas ready to bloody themselves to protect pack and pups— but Betas complain loudly about realism whenever such storylines show up, and as they make up the majority more often than not they’re the ones listened to.

Then there’s the porn thing. The message-board is full of posts about porn. In fact he recognises some screen names from the comments section of the porn he himself has been watching recently, as well as discovering links from the message-board back to the porn database, and especially the collection he’s been perusing, as well as some others supposedly all directed at “real alphas.” He doesn’t know how that makes him feel. Possibly like all alphas are oversexed perverts— but that’s what society has been telling him his whole life. The excuse given by so many is that an unmated alpha gets lonely and sexually frustrated and that perusing porn for “Real Alphas” helps undo Beta sexual social conditioning. Of course even the ones that proclaim to have mates and no longer have any interest in porn seem all too eager to rant about the topic. They all seem obsessed with the depiction of omegas in porn.

He does find himself empathising in ways he never expected to with the accounts these people give of their own early experiences with alpha/omega porn. With the sense of disgust and alienation it made them feel, even with other alphas who speak of rejecting or growing to despise omegas after being exposed to it, of the way omegas are depicted in such porn being the final nail in a coffin built up of society’s narrative of what an omega is. _Alien, animal, lesser._ There is in fact a whole thread dedicated to stories told by alphas who have spent part of their life hating omegas before actually getting to know them, not always as a mate, but forming some kind of close bond with one or more of them and then having to re-evaluate their entire concept of what an omega is in the face of the very different way real omegas behave— especially in heat. As well as being confronted with their own instincts in the face of the experience. 

Which is how he learns that an omega’s scent has a profound impact on the sexual function of an alpha. Or at least an alpha without damage to the anatomical structures that allow scenting, or the healthy psychological processing of the signals received through scenting. An alpha exposed to omega stress pheromones becomes essentially unable to sexually function; other than killing any real sexual desire they feel to actually mate, they become unable to retain an erection or to form a knot. 

This makes producing the normal alpha/omega porn incredibly difficult. For one— with the exception of a couple of studios— no alphas are involved on the production side, not even amongst the crew, because another side effect of exposure to omega stress pheromones is that alphas become highly protective of the omega in question. The studios that do have alpha directors or crews actually work very hard to ensure the comfort and safety of all omegas in their shoots— so any sign of distress or discomfort or outright pain—very popular amongst beta audiences— is nothing more than acting with a very complicated system of nonverbal communication and scenting in place to ensure that the omega is comfortable at all times. There is actually an interview with an alpha porn actor from one of those studios linked on the message-board, though he doesn’t read all of it because his attention gets caught by the woman talking about her early career working for other studios that mandate the use of scent suppressants, pheromone scrubbers on set, as well as strongly scented topical ointments applied to the inside of the alpha’s nose to prevent scenting, and how traumatic her experiences working for such studios had been. 

It seems grotesque. It is grotesque. It’s also supported by other things he reads. Most depressingly the high mortality rate— mainly due to suicide, drug overdose, and other self-destructive behaviours— of both alpha and omega porn actors in the industry. 

Another thing is that very few omega porn actors are willing to perform while they’re in heat unless they trust everyone in the crew and especially any alphas/betas/omegas they’ll be performing with. Their own instincts are heightened at the time, and if distressed this can lead to outbursts of aggression, and even the most rigid regime of scent suppressants, pheromone scrubbers, and the use of the aromatic ointments can’t stop a healthy alpha’s own instinctual protective reactions when faced by an omega in heat. 

He then reads of underground pornography produced with omegas drugged with the same type of drugs Hux mentioned and using alphas whose capacity to scent or react appropriately to scents has been damaged— but just touching on the subject momentarily is enough to make him sick with rage. 

It’s funny. He feels so very much less unique, less broken in so many ways, after what he’s read— but at the same time he wonders if the universe itself is what is broken. Why is the narrative of what an alpha is so destructive, if these alphas are claiming it bears no truth to their own real nature? It’s compelling. This version of alphadom. Something even he could maybe live with.

His own observations from when he first looked for porn of omegas in heat is also confirmed. A lot of so-called omega porn actresses are actually _betas_ — which leads into a massive and obviously ongoing debate about the value of betas in society. A lot of the “real alphas” despise betas, both beta males and beta females, and speak of beta females much the same as they accuse beta society of speaking of omegas. Beta males are simply dismissed out of hand as unfuckable and thus without value(untrue or else he wouldn’t have that faint, very faint, tinge of guilt when he spends too much time in FN-2037’s company). Another side of the argument values betas— as long as the pack is “healthy,” in which case the bad behaviour of betas is seemingly counteracted? He doesn’t quite understand it— and sees them as important and loyal pack members. Then there are those in relationships with betas, either solely with a beta, or in more than a few cases with one or more betas and an omega. Or those that have been in relationships with betas and either look back on said relationship fondly— or are now over-defensive about proclaiming that they’re really only attracted to omegas but were confused in the past. These threads are often a confusing mess of defensiveness on the part of “betasexual” or “beta-attracted” alphas and aggression from others that claim to be “anti-beta,” and he gets so irritated he soon gives up on reading it, but his attention is still caught on the multiple threads and replies to threads about alphas in relationships with beta males wanting advice on how to stop other betas from harassing their mates. A thing for which there does not seem to be a concrete solution other than “become the Dominant Alpha of your pack and then they’ll usually stop harassing your mate as long as you make sure to acknowledge your mate appropriately— but then your mate might end up getting harassed by omegas instead unless you have a really healthy pack.”

Except nowhere is there a concrete and unquestioned definition of what a healthy pack is. Everyone seems to know what it’s not— even himself, he knows what a healthy pack isn’t, he is currently the Dominant Alpha of an unhealthy pack— but no one can clearly define what it is in anything less vague than “a pack where everyone knows their place and is comfortable in it, and alphas and betas and omegas are all treated appropriately.”

At this point he’s confused and overwhelmed and feeling weirdly small and mortal in a way he doesn’t like, in a way he doesn’t feel as long as he’s Kylo Ren, lightsabre in hand, the Force just waiting to be called on, anyone who pisses him off mere moments away from becoming a corpse. He wants Luke. He wants Hux. He wants to lie curled up in a nest with another warm body. Right now he doesn’t really know who he is. He gets the sense that he only got to here— this moment, this person, Kylo Ren instead of Ben Solo, because of some of this stuff he’d internalised yet innately rejected. Would he still be Ben Solo if his father had never handed over that database of porn holos? Now that— that is a disturbing thought.


	19. Chapter 19

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My heart goes out to any Kiwi readers I might have or anyone with friends or family in New Zealand, as it does to any of you out there who live with tragedy and cruelty and the immediate reminder that the world is not a safe place. I wish we as a species could do better, I wish this didn't keep happening. I hope you are all safe this night/day and in the days to come. 
> 
> As always thank you, all of you. I want to also give a special thanks to the talented 5ovSpades for this wonderful piece of fanart:http://5ovspades.tumblr.com/post/183464121497/what-you-sow-for-runrarebit-and-a-abo-story-of   
> Do please go and admire it.

The next day he feels pensive. He’s approached early on as he’s pacing the ship by another alpha who thinks asking _his_ permission to court _Hux_ is a good idea. As if Hux can’t think for himself(as if he’s ever going to give anyone permission to try and take what he wants for himself). He doesn’t kill her. Though he does come close. Instead he lets her limp off to the medbay and then marches his way to the bridge, shooing a startled commstech away from his console, only to drag the little beta back again to instruct him on how to message every ship on the fleet. He tells them in his own words, using his own voice, that if they want to court Hux they will ask _Hux_ for permission, and if Hux says “no” and they keep harassing his General anyway they will be lucky if the only thing he does is flush them out of the airlock. 

When he’s done he looks up to find Hux watching him, pretty face unreadable, and then a small crack over that icy façade. Amusement. A touch of pleasure. And it’s easy to reach out, and it feels like he doesn’t even have to probe deep, that he can gently brush the redhead’s mind and know that Hux feels, here in the light of the bridge, after their recent conversations and the omega’s growing knowledge of him, and growing sense that maybe he won’t actually try and force Hux into anything, Hux feels both grateful and uncertain in himself for that sense of gratitude, but also that if an alpha was pushing the issue quite perfectly capable of shooting the bastard either in the head or somewhere it hurts— depending on exactly how impolite the alpha in question was being. 

That evening the first thing he does is ask Hux why the omega is humouring him, why the man is being so open and honest with him— because Hux has told him so many things he can’t imagine the omega shares with just anyone. He’s so thankful, indescribably thankful, but it feels delicate— as though Hux will suddenly come to his senses and lock him out again. 

The redhead shrugs, looking pensive, as though the omega’s emotions are a tangle to himself as well. ‘I suppose because I decided that if I said something that pissed you off enough that you broke your word and hurt me then I’d at least know this was just a game, just a momentary impulse of yours, that you were never serious—' Hux breaks off, a blush heating his cheeks, frustration and confusion lighting up his mind. He doesn’t push into that knot of feelings, he doesn’t force Hux’s mind to divulge all the details of what the omega feels, but it’s hard. So very hard.

‘I’m never going to hurt you again,’ he promises and hopes— no. He _decides_ that he’ll keep that promise. 

Later he brings up everything he read on the message board, asking Hux, who seems to actually know about these things, what he thinks of the self-proclaimed “Real Alphas.” Hux’s nose wrinkles in the most delightful way as the omega contemplates the question for a moment. ‘It’s complicated,’ is what Hux starts with, which he could have already guessed and isn’t exactly what he wanted to hear. ‘Based on what I’ve read they really do have a point. Studies on alphas in isolation from other alphas, studies that include alphas as part of pack with more sexually egalitarian values, studies on Dominant or other high ranking Alphas, and on alphas in general from more sexually egalitarian worlds or worlds with a population with a higher percentage of alphas and omegas, seem to confirm a lot of what these “real alphas” are saying— and what we know of gender roles in most of the oldest extant societies, and the cultural remains of now extinct societies, as well as the most “old-fashioned” traditions of a considerable portion of current societies seem to also support something like what they’re saying.’

Here Hux takes a deep breath, and he can feel the “but” in the air before it slips those lovely red lips. ‘ _But_ from my own experiences and the experiences of omegas I’m close to, and from studies conducted on groups of equally ranked alphas, on alphas as part of a sexually non-egalitarian pack whose hierarchy places omegas firmly on the bottom, and quite often in studies on lower ranking alphas, and on alphas from worlds that again place little value on omegas—’ a little, rueful smile, unamused, twitches around Hux’s lips ‘—funnily enough in most such societies male omegas end up on the bottom of the hierarchy, with the social value of female betas and omegas often very confused. Female omegas are fetishized for their sexuality and heat cycles and considered more sexually valuable, but the intelligence and moral value of female betas is often considered higher, which may enable them to gain some social privileges over female omegas, even though such societies are also often heavily prejudiced against the female-bodied sexes—‘ The redhead, blinks, shakes his head a little as if to shake his attention back on track. ‘I digress. Um. Yes, and on alphas from worlds with an overwhelming majority of the population being betas we do tend to see a different story, a story which places a lot less value on omegas and with gender roles a lot more like what I think of, and what I suspect you do to, when I think of what I’ve personally experienced. There are a lot of arguments about why this is, and maybe your “real alphas” have a point, maybe it is largely social conditioning and the power betas have over society— but at the same time betas are not the enemy it sounds like they’re making them out to be. There are a lot of good betas, smart betas, betas that question that _neo-traditional_ — because on every world and in every society this stuff occurs it is always labelled as “tradition” even if actual research has proven that traditionally the gender roles on that world or in that society were something very, very different—view of gender roles. If it wasn’t for betas our entire fleet would be non-functional right now— and yes, some of them are proving to be problematic, but the majority are not. The majority are respectful and hard working and have less of a problem with me being the so-called _Dominant Omega_ than a lot of omegas and, let us not forget, alphas.’

‘What about rape though?’ he asks, remembering what the assassins had planned. Hux given to the betas. Fuck. He wishes he could kill them all again and make it hurt worse. ‘Betas rape omegas, don’t they? You certainly had to execute a fair few of them for doing so when this all started.’

Hux nods. ‘Yes, betas rape omegas— but so do alphas and other omegas. In fact, “corrective rape” of socially or sexually non-compliant omegas by other omegas is a very real and often unacknowledged problem.’ He can see that. That seems sort of what was happening when the omegas had promised the betas they could have Hux. It’s confusing, his instincts don’t like the idea of it— and he thinks it is his instincts, and not just social conditioning. The redhead keeps talking, ‘The effect omega distress pheromones have on alphas is true though— not diffused as it has been across the entire ship since all this started, or else no alpha would be able to sexually perform right now and things would have become a hell of a lot more chaotic, but during intimate contact or if the omega is in the same room as the alpha, or very close by, or at a distance if the scent of the omega in question is known to the alpha and of someone the alpha values. So yes, unless the alpha cannot scent the scent, or cannot appropriately process the scent, or if the alpha is wearing some form of personal pheromone scrubber, or if the omega has been dosed with the drugs I mentioned—’ here Hux’s eyes go blank for a moment, the scent of outrage rising, memories of what he had seen as a child flickering loudly across his mind. ‘—Yes. Unless one of those conditions are met alphas do not generally rape omegas. They do rape betas though, and other alphas. Mainly betas. Though admittedly rarely if they’re actually mated. Mated alphas have trouble sexually functioning away from their mates—’ a little smirk crossed Hux’s face. ‘I wonder— did they mention that a lot on the message-board?’

He shakes his head, frowns. Wonders why. ‘No. No they didn’t.’

Hux frowns at him, looking a little bemused. ‘You look like you don’t understand why alphas are ashamed of that fact.’

‘They are?’ Why would they be?

‘Yes,’ Hux nods. ‘From what I understand even your “real alphas” find it a challenge to their virility.’

‘But why?’ he asks. It seems— odd. To him the idea is strangely appealing. As if all the confusing nonsense of sexual attraction, all that diffuse tangle of want and do-not-want-to-want and don’t-want-but-probably-should-want, could just disappear in favour of a singular focus. One person to devote himself to. One— his eyes flick unconsciously over the lush redness of Hux’s mouth.

‘Seriously?’ the redhead asks, head tilted to the side, copper hair escaping its careful application of gel to brush his cheek. ‘If you could only want _one_ person, could only fuck _one_ person, as long as you remained mated to them, you wouldn’t find that frustrating, emasculating?’

He shakes his head. ‘No? Should I?’

A little laugh, almost a giggle, escapes from Hux. ‘No! Be yourself Ren!’ and then the tantalizing glimmer of the thought that, based on their recent conversations, Hux finds the self he actually is much more interesting than the redhead could have ever expected. 

He’s almost glowing from pride, from pleasure in the thought that Hux might like him, even if only a little bit. Might find him interesting. He wants Hux to continue to find him interesting. To continue to want to spend time with him. His mind desperately searches for something interesting to say, but as is so often the case the desire to be interesting just makes him feel blank and boring, so he goes for the next best option of ensuring Hux at least somewhat enjoys spending time with him— which is to get Hux talking again. Luke always told him that if he wanted to make friends he would have to show interest in them, ask them about themselves, and be willing to listen— or at least pretend to listen. It’s funny, he hadn’t actually even been willing to listen to his _uncle_ at the time. ‘What about female alphas?’ he blurts out ‘I mean, in the heavily sexually hierarchical worlds you were talking about earlier. Where do they rank?’

A blink. A little smile. The scent of something like contentment. He is learning that Hux does like being able to talk about the things he knows. ‘Their role in such societies is often the most variable. In some their “alphaness” outweighs their “femininity,” so they end up ranked as high, or just beneath, male alphas— while in other societies their “femininity” becomes their defining factor, their “alphaness” making them socially valueless as objects of sexual desire, often leaving them in a sort of limbo-state— not quite as lowly ranked as male omegas, but considered unmarriageable and perpetually “other”— and, amusingly, often used to guard high ranking alphas’ mates, as though by being both “female” and “alpha” they automatically became “sexless”. You can guess how that tends to end—’ a smirk at the fate of those hapless alphas, setting a fox to guard their henhouse. ‘There have even traditionally been some societies, the type of societies that have always “traditionally” been sexually non-egalitarian— because even though they are rare they do exist— that refused to believe that Female Alphas and Male Omegas existed, or thought that they were wrong, unnatural, perhaps cursed by the Gods or brought about through some error of the Force— either forcing them to live their lives as betas, or outright killing them at birth— if the society had access to the standard blood tests used to detect sub-gender— or at puberty when heat and rut manifest. Most of such societies have either changed or died out by now, or at least no longer routinely practice infanticide.’

‘That’s ridiculous—’ he begins, ‘—not that they’ve died out! But that such societies even existed in the first place.’ He thinks for a moment, frowning. He needs another topic to keep Hux talking— one that matters to him as well. ‘From what you’ve said there is no _one_ way for society, for a pack, to function?’

‘I guess so,’ Hux says with a small shrug. ‘As I said, it’s complicated. As a species we are inclined to tell ourselves narratives about what we are and then cling to those narratives, those stories, as if they are absolute truth.’

‘So—’ how to put this? It seems an immeasurably important question to ask all of a sudden. ‘So, how do you want our pack to be structured? I got some notion of you having a Utopia from Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio—’

‘He’s a very unhappy man, isn’t he?’ Hux says, which doesn’t answer his question, but as the redhead looks concerned about the alpha maybe it’s worth spending a moment discussing him. He is not jealous. _He is not._ Anyway, there is no hint of attraction in Hux’s mind, scent, when the redhead mentions the other alpha. 

‘He’s attracted to other alphas and ashamed about it,’ he tells the redhead. 

‘Ah,’ Hux nods. ‘I see. I thought it was something like that.’

‘It makes sense to you?’ He asks, ‘Because the whole thing has always confused me. I mean, I sort of understand it, I do, but it’s more intellectual than instinctual.’

‘Really?’ Hux asks, peering at him for a moment. Then ‘You are not what I expected. Most alphas get very defensive when they hear of alpha-attracted alphas.’

‘Yes, I know,’ he shakes his head, remembering his father. ‘It’s all very confusing. If you’re not attracted to alphas being near one who is isn’t going to change that, and if you are what’s the point of being ashamed? Just go out there and find yourself an alpha who feels the same way and stop annoying me with your feelings—’ a moment. A remembrance. Now he feels a bit like a hypocrite, ‘— though I guess who am I to talk? Before recently if you’d accused me of being attracted to omegas I would have been just as defensive.’

Hux frowns at him. ‘I’m sorry?’

Should he discuss this with Hux? Probably not. Still— he wants Hux to trust him. He wants Hux to like him. He wants Hux to let him court him. He wants to sweet-talk Hux into the perfect nest he hasn’t yet built and then spend a week knotting the redhead until neither of them can walk. He remembers another bit of his uncle’s advice for getting on with people. Yet another attempt by Luke to help that he’d dismissed out of hand. Openness and honesty. Openness and honesty. Openness and honesty like Hux’s openness and honesty. If only openness and honesty felt a little less humiliating. 

So, slowly, he begins to talk about growing up, rejecting omegas, defining himself as beta-attracted— not that he’d used that term, that’s a term he got from the message-board— haltingly bringing up his relationship with his father and his experiences with porn— even if the latter makes him glow bright red and feel like crawling out of his skin in embarrassment, but _openness and honesty_ — and the things he’s been thinking and then the way Hux makes him feel and all his confusion about it all. He does not bring up looking at Luke and wanting to fuck him and being sick and ashamed of himself, because there’s openness and honesty and then there’s saying something that guarantees he’ll never get Hux in his hypothetical nest. 

The entire time one part of himself expects Hux to make him regret opening up, expects Hux to be disgusted, or contemptuous, or mocking, but the redhead listens to him attentively, and not even in Hux’s surface thoughts can he sense scorn. He wonders about what’s beneath, if somewhere deep down Hux is disgusted with him, but he doesn’t want to probe too deep— he knows that it causes discomfort to the one he’s probing. Anyway, even brushing the redhead’s surface thoughts too long is uncomfortable for him— because there’s an element there, a sense of something still a little like hysterical disbelief, that what is happening is happening. That they’re talking, that they’re getting to know each other, that he hasn’t done anything to hurt Hux since he promised not to. The redhead still doesn’t trust him, he must not let himself forget that fact. He needs to earn that trust. 

Hux doesn’t really have much to say after his confession, but that’s alright, he can sense that the redhead wants to think on it for a while and that Hux doesn’t really trust him enough to bring up the omega’s own experiences with porn. He remembers what he felt from Hux’s mind and shudders. Of course the redhead would find it as alienating and disgusting as he finds it himself, _more_ alienating and disgusting— to be thought of like that, reduced to that— when Hux is so much more than his sexual potential, a sexual potential that in turn shouldn’t be reduced to its most vulgar, painful and humiliating iteration. A person. A brilliant, intelligent, beautiful, stubborn, determined person with such a crystal-clear view of a better future, such a delightful capacity for violence. His words on the bridge, the way he’d humiliated the omega for getting himself off, stick in both their minds. Shame. And shame in himself for making Hux feel shame, when the redhead should never feel that way for seeking pleasure— even if his General ever takes someone else to bed the omega shouldn’t feel shame, but the bastard who dares lay hands on what is _his_ will feel things that make shame a delight.

They return to the topic of Hux’s Utopia— nothing more exotic than a Galaxy in which no doors are barred because of gender or sexual preference, where what matters is merit and hard work, where there is peace, where there is compliance to rules that have been sensibly thought out based on facts and not instinctual bias, where emotions and sentimentality are not allowed to rule the day. 

He decides that as Dominant Alpha of the First Order Hux’s Utopia is a thing he can bring about. So he will. 

He goes to bed thinking about it, but before he falls to sleep his mind flickers back to earlier topics. To the alpha his life has made him, to his confusion— his mind lingering on the idea not of making himself a ‘real alpha’ so much as an alpha he can live with— and then and oddly enough to why he ended up thinking himself only attracted to betas, _female_ betas, in the first place. 

_He dreams that he is smaller, younger, a child again, but one who considers himself too old and grown up to hold his uncle’s large, warm hand, as they return to the house. They have been out in the gardens of this small yet fancy house that his parents are staying at while his mother is on assignment on this beautiful, verdant world of plants and flowers and fruit and endless small winged things that hop from bough to bough to lap up nectar or half-eat fruit that they drop to a sweet-sour stinking rot below. Luke has been helping him focus his grasp on the Force, to stop getting so distracted, to stop reaching for it blindly, grabbing any side of it that comes near to do what he wants. Luke has been trying to get him to reach only for the Light Side. They have been channelling the finest threads of the Force into the flowers, pushing them along to fruit faster than nature intends— and now he is tired and Luke smells warm and content and like both his parents, because his uncle has been staying with them these last weeks while they have been here, and they come back in the back door but they must be too quiet because his parents don’t hear them from where they’re arguing deeper in the house, and his uncle’s scent sours as they both hear his mother shout at his father to ‘Stop flirting with Luke if you don’t mean it!’_

_And then his father’s defensiveness, and his father’s declarations that he has no use for an omega, definitely not a male one, and omegas are fun, **female** omegas, but you can’t really settle down with one, you can’t have a relationship with one, you can’t **love** one, they’re not built to be loved, just fucked, they’re not like betas, you can’t have a meeting of the mind like with a beta, and— it goes on. But he’s both the child standing, wanting to hold his uncle’s hand as Luke goes very still and begins to really stink of distress, but he’s also the man he is now, and that man hears his father’s desperation, his fear that his mate thinks he wishes to leave her for her brother, society always saying that an omega is better than a beta, and his father’s own uncertainty of what it means to be attracted to a _male_ omega while still being in love with his _female_ beta mate, but he also hears what his father did not, what he thinks Luke did not, that what his mother actually means is not “you are my mate, stop looking elsewhere” but “your actions are hurting my beloved brother” with a lot less jealousy and a lot more love, and, from the fragments he hears of what his mother is trying to say while being shouted over by his frantic father, maybe something that suggests his mother sees a future for all three of them if her mate gets his shit together. _

_Luke moves beside the child him, reaching up and wiping his flesh-and-blood hand roughly across his face, and then he is that child looking up and seeing his uncle’s distress, and hearing his father’s anger, and all he wants is to be good— all he wants is to be loved, and Luke will love him no matter what, and his mother will probably do the same, but his father’s the one he isn’t confident of, his father— often dismissive, never really emotionally serious, fond of mockery and critical of the overly affectionate way the other two treat him— and the words his father is saying about not being able to really mate with an omega— and—_

He wakes and feels an idiot and angry once more, because just how much did Han Solo fuck up by not being able to own up to who he really was, what he really wanted? Though maybe it wasn’t his father’s fault. The two of them never really talked about much, he has no idea the ideas of alphadom his father had internalised, no idea if Han had moments like he did, faced with alienating porn, no idea of the value system that his father grew up with, no idea where male omegas showed up on the hierarchy of both pack status and sexual desirability in his father’s mind, no idea if his father even knew that it’s not unheard of for alphas or omegas to take more than one mate, that a triad of alpha, beta, and omega would have hardly seemed strange on many worlds— and that’s just from what he knows, if he asked Hux about it he may learn so much more. Still, he curses the man, his father, his sire, for all his failings, and then, suddenly, unexpectedly, he decides to forgive him. Han Solo is a thing of the past, dead and gone, and he is not and never could have been the alpha his father wanted as a son. Perhaps that’s all for the best. No crude facsimile of Han Solo would be Dominant Alpha of such a pack as he is, would have a Dominant Omega like Hux in their pack, would have the merest chance to court a Dominant Omega like Hux. 

He wants to see the redhead.


	20. Chapter 20

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always I want to thank you all for reading my fic; writing this story and then seeing the positive reception it's getting in kudos and subscriptions and bookmarks, as well as reading all your lovely comments, is proving a really nice experience. Thank you all so much for allowing me to have it. I hope you are all well and having a good time!

This morning instead of heading for one of the training rooms, which is what he’s been doing every morning since Hux suggested he try to integrate himself better in the pack, he heads straight for the bridge— not to bother his General, but just to look at him. Just for a moment. Just— well, why shouldn’t he? He doesn’t need to make excuses for himself, if he wants to go admire Hux he has every right to go and admire Hux. Hux is very admirable. So he does. 

The redhead is as lovely as ever, marching up and down the bridge, accepting reports, examining datasheets, giving orders. At his shoulders are FN-2037 and Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio— the latter who gives him an evil look as he approaches. He and the Lieutenant are getting on better and he can’t deny he enjoys sparring with the other alpha— the man is strong and fast and coming along nicely as a fighter— but the man still does not like to see him near his General. 

He almost stops when he finally gets close enough to scent Hux— there it is again, for the first time since he humiliated the redhead about it on the bridge. The scent of sexual satisfaction, the smell of water-blossoms heavy, musky, sweeter than usual— he huffs in a breath, another, trying to filter than scent, trying to detect anyone else but Hux within it— again it is only the scent of the redhead. He really shouldn’t— he doesn’t trust himself right now— but— delicate he reaches out, just lightly brushes the redhead’s mind. Another breath sucked in roughly and choked on. His twitches, swells, hardens in preparation for something he can’t have.

_No one else, just Hux, on his back on his berth, the new berth, the nest-like berth, the berth **he** chose for him, fist up his ass, trying to ease himself, trying to relieve himself, trying to grind away the knife-edge of his eternal, niggling arousal—_

The redhead’s eyes flicker over to him then, wary. Wary but almost daring him to say something, to do something, to prove all his promises to be lies. Hux knows he can smell him. Hux is just waiting to see what he does. He snorts out a breath, trying to clear his nose, straightens up out of the head-forward, hungry pose he’s unconsciously fallen into, and approaches. Calm. Calm. Projecting all the calm in the universe, all the calm he doesn’t really feel. He can barely hear over the heartbeat in his ears. 

‘Good morning Supreme Leader,’ his General says as he falls into step beside the redhead, FN-2037 slipping back out of his way. 

‘Good Morning General Hux,’ he replies. ‘Anything to report?’

‘No Supreme Leader, everything has been quiet.’ the redhead seems pleased that he’s manged to behave himself, which makes him in turn feel good. Yes. There _are_ rewards for being good. Then he feels momentarily annoyed, as if he’s a pet, being petted for good behaviour— but it’s not Hux petting him, patronising him, all Hux is doing in responding to his own actions. It’s those that are the problem, the fact that he has behaved so badly by Hux in the past that the omega can feel pleasantly surprised at his lack of cruelty now. 

Guilt. Before he can get too involved in wallowing in it an alpha approaches, a lieutenant with very good posture. Familiar— that’s the first thing he thinks. The alpha, male, strongly built though not as tall as he is, and not so much handsome as _striking,_ with a heavy-boned, leonine face, is approaching Hux, wary. The body language more of a man making himself do something than actually wishing to do so. He might be one of the newest group of lurkers on the bridge, though he has noticed that some have dissipated the last few times he’s been here— though he is not sure why, or when it happened. A quick probe of the minds around him is of little help, all attention on the alpha coming ever closer to his General.

He does not let himself fall into a threat posture, but it’s a hard-won battle to keep himself from puffing up, tensing, dropping his head down. It’s even harder to stop himself from growling. 

‘General Hux, Sir,’ the alpha salutes in greeting. ‘May we speak privately?’

A scent starts to tickle the air. Faint. Confusing. He’s not sure what it is— it’s not coming from Hux— 

‘Anything you wish to say to me can be said here,’ his General replies, looking markedly unimpressed. 

‘I don’t—’ the alpha begins, looking both hesitant and somewhat queasy. ‘If you say so? Er—’ the alpha looks away for a moment but he could swear those grey eyes are actually focussed on something past Hux, and are not just staring into the ether. The alpha gathers himself. ‘Er. General Hux, Sir. I would like permission to court you—’

The scent of distress rises, discernible, in the air around them. It’s an odd scent. Not in that floral, musky variety of omegas, but— a little spicy? A little woody? A little like the sea, but without the floral element of Hux or Luke— Maybe like lavender, which is a flower, but not an overly _floral_ smelling one— It’s FN-2037. Suddenly he remembers where this alpha is familiar from. The beta’s memories. He glances back behind them and sees the Stormtrooper standing stiff, the image of professionalism in the face of adversity. 

He reaches out, probes deep into the alpha’s mind, sees the man’s attention on FN-2037, feels his continuing humiliation from being caught with the beta, feels his misery, his torn desires, the sense of something still there a little like love, his lack of anything like desire for Hux, for any omega, the fact that what he is doing right now is what he considers his duty for his family, his lineage, the only way he knows to undo the shame he has brought on himself, his family, his blood.

All the while he has been observing what’s been going on, what’s been going on has continued going. ‘No, I do not give you permission to court me,' Hux says, calm, but unambiguous.

‘But why?’ the alpha bleats. ‘I’m from a good family, we’d make a good match, please, give me a reas—’ the alpha breaks off, huffs out a yelp of terror as he lurches forward, wraps one of his hands around the man’s neck and leans in close. 

‘He said no,’ he whispers in the alpha’s ear, carefully only exerting enough pressure that the alpha can _feel_ it, but not so much that it risks doing him damage. Behind them he can smell, feel, sense FN-2037’s misery. His fear for this alpha that he does not want to care for, his fear that he’ll kill him, and all those torn and unpleasant feelings that arise at the thought. FN-2037 wants to be over this man, wants not to care, but his feelings are lingering in a twisted morass of guilt and anger and hurt. ‘What did I say would happen to people who did not listen when he said no?’

After a moment’s terrified silence the alpha eventually manages to stutter out ‘You-You-You’d th-throw them out th-th-e air-airlock?’

‘Not exactly,’ he leans in close, speaks low and mean. ‘I said they’d be lucky if that’s all I did. Now, what should I do to you?’

‘I’m sorry!’ the alpha yelps. ‘I didn’t mean to— Look, I don’t even want to—’

‘Oh,’ he interrupts the man, snarling quietly into his ear. ‘That I know. I know exactly what it is you want, except you’re too much of a fucking coward to keep it, aren’t you? The first sign of trouble and you run away. What kind of alpha are you? Even though you went to all the trouble of winning him in the first place. Even though you actually built him a nest—’ That seems to be too much for the alpha, because a deep, bass growl erupts from the man’s chest. A scoff of contempt and he shakes him, reminds him exactly who has their hand on his neck. ‘Now, I could kill you, I very much want to kill you, but killing you might demoralise the man you once called mate— and right now he’s a very important part of our pack. Much more important than you’ll ever be. So why don’t you slink off out of here and stop bothering people.’ Another shake and the man goes almost limp in his grasp. He lets the alpha go, steps back, watches the man glance once, just once, longingly past Hux to FN-2037, before sloping off.

‘Fucking prick,‘ he hears, spoken quietly, and looks back in surprise to see the words have come from Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio. The other alpha is looking pissed off and protective, standing puffed up by FN-2037’s side. Huh. He wouldn’t have guessed they’d get along. He would have thought their collective issues and shame would make them more adversarial towards each other, seeing something of a mirror of the parts of themselves they don’t like in the other person. He is pleased to be proved wrong. 

‘I’m surprised you didn’t kill him,’ Hux muses.

His eyes flick back to FN-2037 and he feels something like gratitude and something like shame coming from this beta he has guarding his Hux. He turns his gaze back to Hux ‘If he approaches you again he won’t be so lucky.’

A snort of a laugh from the redhead, and then the smallest movement of his General’s head so those pale eyes can also flick back to see FN-2037. ‘I doubt that he will.’ After their eyes meet. An acknowledgement that they both know the story there, though no censure from Hux about getting him entangled in it by assigning FN-2037 to his guard. He can read no prejudice there in Hux’s mind, no disgust or anger or confusion, just a faint hint of sympathy for the Stormtrooper’s situation combined with a kind of admiration that FN-2037 never lets it get in the way of his duty. Hux likes people who are hard working and dutiful, they make the First Order operate better. ‘I am having lunch in the Medbay with Captain Phasma and Lieutenant Mitaka,’ Hux says, seemingly out of nowhere, and he’s just forcing the rising disappointment down when the redhead adds ‘Would you like to join us?’

He thinks of Phasma’s knowing eyes and the way she’s never impressed with him and almost says “no,” but— ‘Of course.’

Hux nods, glances over to him, pale eyes unreadable. ‘I’ll meet you there.’ Something like a dismissal, but a gentle one. He agrees, heads out intending to go to the training rooms as he should have earlier. As he leaves the bridge he can feel it in the minds around him, as far as the crew is concerned he is now officially courting Hux— all those who feel they have no real chance with the redhead, or are too afraid of him, or were hanging around until they determined whether attempting to win Hux might be politically advantageous, have now deserted the field. Some are still lingering at the edges to see if he’ll be successful, but the others are off either to try and win other mates from the small pool remaining or sulking in their rooms. 

Dark eyes meet his as he passes, body language still aggressive, but not outright challenging— that pale alpha he threw off the bridge that time. There is still contempt for him in her mind, and he almost strikes out at her— but her attentions have changed. She’s no longer lurking around attempting to court his General, instead her eyes have been caught by the little dark-haired officer he thinks is Mitaka. A moment as they passed in the halls, her attention caught as he brushed past in a hurry to perform his duties, no stopping, no deference, no coy coquettish flirtation with her, just dark eyes meeting dark eyes and then he’d continued on his way— that’s what she likes. She likes them prim and prissy and professional and un-deferential to alphas. She knows by now she can’t have Hux— but Hux is a dream, a fantasy, something to grab her knot over and mess up her berth— this other omega, Mitaka, on the other hand— if she decides she actually wants him she might even convince him to let her show him the nest she’s now building. 

He keeps eye contact with her until eventually she looks away, then leaves.


	21. Chapter 21

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, the number of kudos I have on this fic at the time of posting this chapter is 666...
> 
> Anyway, this is only a short one, I hope you don't mind. As always thank you all for reading, leaving comments, and kudos. You all continue to be so very lovely and I enjoy reading your reactions to each chapter when I post them!

He arrives at the Medbay before Hux and the Lieutenant, entering to find Phasma sitting up and gently petting the snoozing cat in her lap. She arches a scarred brow but doesn’t say anything as he approaches her berth, using the Force to drag over a chair and slumping down into it. He looks at her. He looks at the cat. He looks down at his own hands. 

‘So,’ she says after a moment’s awkwardness, ‘You’re actually courting him?’

He looks up, surprised at her audacity. She gazes back, calm, the thought crossing her mind that after everything she’s been through— and here’s a memory of pain and terror and alienation from her own body as strong as anything he ever felt under the less-than-tender mercies of Snoke’s training— she can’t even bring herself to fear him right now. She knows, intellectually, that in time she may once more begin to feel more attached to her life, her existence, her body, but there’s still a distance she feels, something light, almost like the feeling you get just before stepping off a cliff, just before taking a lightsabre to a fellow student, just before telling someone you desire your feelings for them— in her mind he can kill her, but that’s all he can do, and right now she doesn’t fear death. He has a strange moment of empathy with her. The way she feels mirrors something like the way he felt when he finally sobered up in that dark room after he had destroyed his uncle’s temple. After he had killed so many of his fellow students. Not friends. He hadn’t had friends. ‘Not exactly,’ he corrects her ‘I am getting to know him. He is getting to know me. Anything else will have to wait.’

A twitch of her scarred brow. ‘Will it?’ Before he can answer she adds ‘I won’t be in here forever, just so you know, and I will not appreciate it if you hurt him— and yes, I am threatening you, in case there is any ambiguity.’

‘I’m not going to hurt him!’ he insists.

A small smile pulls at her scarred lips. She is impressed, she had expected him to rant and rail, maybe even attack her— and here he looks at her with censure, gaze flicking down to Millicent on her lap. How dare she put the cat in danger! Not that he is a danger. He is not a danger. Not to anyone Hux cares about— unless they do something to endanger the redhead. Then his priority is Hux’s safety, not how the redhead will feel if he kills someone that the omega would otherwise care about when they weren’t trying to hurt him. 

‘She’s very fast,’ Phasma tells him with an affectionate rub of the base of the cat’s ear, ‘And he’ll be here soon. If he’d walked in on you attacking me with Millie in the room that would be the end of all your chances.’ In her mind he can read that as far as she knows if Hux had walked in on him attacking her with Millicent on her lap Hux would have killed him, if not immediately, then all the redhead’s intellect would have been turned to plotting how to kill him sometime soon. 

‘You’re lucky he likes you,’ he mutters, leaning back resentfully in his chair. 

‘Oh, I know I am,’ she says, and from her mind he can see her gratitude for Hux’s forgiveness after she lowered the shields to Starkiller Base. A betrayal of him and all he stands for, a moment of her own weakness, something she is still very ashamed of. In her mind Hux should not have forgiven her, he should have punished her, demoted her, exiled her, executed her— but he did not. Not only did he not but he never seemed all that angry with her, and after she was so badly injured he built for her prostheses to take the place of her destroyed limbs, her ruined eye. She will not let him down again, she has sworn this to herself. 

Another odd moment of empathy. He examines her for a moment, this huge woman, this omega in form unlike anything anyone has ever told him an omega should be— and that was even before her injuries. He had seen her once without her helmet in the past, he thinks, perhaps twice, but it is the once he remembers. She had looked over at him, a frown on her face. Her hair, as with the patches that are all that remain, was blonde, her eyes blue, her face not-unattractive, her figure proportionate— if built on a larger scale. In honesty he does not think she is the kind of omega he would have ever found attractive— even with betas he always liked them smaller than him, slender, lithe, and strong— he thinks of Hux wielding his blaster, feels a shiver run through him. He wants to see the redhead. Still— even if she was not exactly his type he can see an appeal there, in her own strength, in the solidity of her body, in her capacity in a fight— he wonders for a moment why she’s not mated. 

But then, his gaze flickers over the ruin of her face, perhaps it’s for the best that she’s not. It would be intolerable to see Hux so badly injured, he cannot imagine any alpha could bear it if they were her mate. They would be pacing the halls, teeth gnashed, demanding the right of access to a shuttle so they could track down and slaughter FN-2187 and that girl he brought with him onto the ship. Does she even like alphas? An omega as big as her— she looks like the cliché of an omega attracted to omegas. Curious he lets his mind reach out, brushing against hers, probing gently—

There’s hurt there. A lot of hurt. A lot of comments about her looks— especially from other omegas, though never Hux, never Mitaka— and she’s never really been able to trust the professions of attraction from the alphas she’s been with— and it is alphas she likes— and the shame she feels now because even if she didn’t believe them in the past she’ll never get another chance for them, or for herself, to talk her feelings round, and she shouldn’t have taken her looks for granted, because she knows they’re gone now, no alpha will want her— and he finds himself wanting to argue, because yes, she’s been injured, and yes, she is scarred, but that does not change that magnificent strength she has, does not change the woman she is, the omega, and if no alpha is able to look past her injuries to see all that he can’t help think his entire sex is fucking worthless— and somewhere in there, in her mind, he finds a darker, harder, crueller knot of pain wrapped around a moment’s admiration— dark eyes, dark skin, not so tall— but strong, and smart— if a little pathetic— Just a moment. Just a gaze at him. No more than that. Not even a crush, no great passion there, but inside the hurt and fury and self-disgust she feels there’s the knowledge that the state she’s found herself in now can be laid at the door of an alpha she once thought attractive— if only for the merest moment. Just a second. She’ll kill him the next time they meet, she’s sworn it to herself.

He admires her for it in an odd way. He can understand that drive to destroy the things about oneself that one finds shameful, even of others wouldn’t. 

When she’s recovered enough to leave the Medbay and start bringing herself back to combat-readiness he should ask her to spar with him— he remembers that moment they fought back to back against Hux’s assassins, her speed, her strength— she is another member of the pack whose value he has been negligent in recognising. 

Luckily he’s saved from having to say something so embarrassing by the arrival of Hux and Mitaka. The moment the redhead enters the Medbay Millicent opens her eyes, and as they approach the cat sits up, stretches, then with delicate paws walks across the berth, jumps into his lap, climbs up his torso to his shoulder while he sits frozen, alarmed that he’ll move in some way that will hurt her and also glad that his armour is protecting him from her tiny, razor-sharp claws, and then up onto his head to wait to be scooped up by her owner on the way past. It happens in moments and then she’s in Hux’s arms and the redhead is almost projecting _relief_ and a complicated tangle of feelings. Hux is beginning to think he can be trusted with her, and that makes Hux feel all sorts of confusion. 

Mitaka fetches a chair for himself and Hux and the two omegas sit, Mitaka as far away from him as the dark-haired omega can get, and Millicent quite happily occupying the redhead’s lap. They order food from the kitchens, himself electing for a massive cut of red meat, cooked just enough that it still oozes red when he cuts into it, and served with roasted root vegetables and steamed greens. Phasma has a soup, apparently she still has some pain in her jaw from muscle damage and isn’t quite up to chewing on anything too solid just yet. The Lieutenant has a pastry stuffed with spicy smelling meat and herbs. Hux has steamed fish of some kind, with the same root vegetables and greens as him, and he watches as the redhead nibbles on the pale flesh and then intermittently selects a small piece and feeds it to his cat. 

The omegas talk amongst themselves about morale and the Stormtrooper programme and issues that any of the three may have to deal with, him with nothing much to contribute, but still he feels content as he eats and watches and sits amongst them, Dominant Alpha happily surrounded with the important omegas of his pack.


	22. Chapter 22

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A slightly longer chapter than last time. I hope you all like it and am looking forward to reading the comments that it gets. I'm posting on Sunday night here in Australia, so once more I'll be saying I hope you've all had/are having a good weekend, and thank you as always for reading, leaving kudos, commenting, and all the ways you've made me feel like you appreciate my writing.

In the afternoon he is supposed to meet Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio and FN-2037 in the training rooms, but when he arrives he can’t spot them. This is odd as the two are prompt and punctual almost to a fault. He can smell them though, hints of alpha pheromones, beta— he snorts. Pain and sadness and arousal and protectiveness and comfort all tangled together. He tracks the scent to bathroom off to the side, not opening the door as he catches their thoughts. _They are in there, together, tangled up on the tiled floor. The Lieutenant is on top of the Stormtrooper, hips grinding against hips, trying to get his hands underneath the beta’s training pants, trying to get his fingers inside, a mirror to the fingers of FN-2037, hand shoved down the back of Kanron-Viellio’s pants, fingers prodding at the alpha’s ass. They’re murmuring to each other, praise and affection, affirmation, but also winding each other up with the thought of another alpha being there, an alpha for them to share, an alpha to take their turn with them as they lie tangled together, kissing and petting each other—_

He backs away. Best leave them to it. He’d normally interrupt them as this is not what they’re supposed to be doing— but. But they are generally hard working and dutiful, and the misery that surrounds them palls at times, and it might do them good to come together in this way, and— he’s happy for them. He’s not sure this is a relationship, or if it’ll last if it is, or if the two of them will try to find an alpha together— but he is happy for them. He thinks he would be happy for almost anyone right now who manages to win themselves anything like a mate— as long as that mate is not Hux. Then he would be very angry indeed. 

_Hux is his._

He is also happy that he feels no jealousy that someone else has gotten their hands on FN-2037— he has been a little worried that he’s been coveting the beta at the same time as falling for Hux— something even he could never forgive himself for. Something Hux would never forgive him for. But, apparently, it is possible to think a person is attractive without being attracted to them on more than a superficial level, and to be happy when they have found someone else. Maybe that’s just because Hux is Hux, and no one he has ever met comes close— 

Not even Rey. 

Huh. He probes at his feelings for her, again, focussing not just on his attraction, but the sense of longing and fondness— pale in comparison to what he feels for Hux. What he feels for her after being separated for so many weeks almost nothing compared to what he feels separated from Hux by mere hours. 

That night Hux invites him to dine in the redhead’s rooms instead of the conference room. The thought is thrilling. He bathes first, scrubs himself almost raw, and then fusses around trying to work out which are his best, most flattering, robes, and whether he should do something different with his hair, and does he smell unpleasant— like foul, stinky alpha? Oh he probably does. Does he have any cologne? No he does not. Ok, so foul, stinky alpha it will have to be— but maybe not like blood? His armour smells of blood. And sweat. He really should get it cleaned. He has a spare set but it’s a bit fancier— more ceremonial— ok, now he looks like an idiot. He looks like he’s trying too hard. He looks— fuckit. He is trying hard. He has reasons to try hard. All he needs to do is relax. 

Relax.

_Relax._

He brushes his hair back out of his eyes and heads off to Hux’s rooms. The version of his General that greets him is disappointingly the same as always, still starched and buttoned up, the only change in appearance the removal of his cap and greatcoat. It is odd, awkward, strangely titillating, being in these rooms with Hux, even though he chose these rooms for Hux. He looks around, looks to see what’s changed, only to discover that nothing really has— maybe that’s not true, he can smell Hux here now in this previously sterile place. He huffs in a deep breath— and with it catches hints of what he knows Hux has done. Hux has masturbated, Hux has stuffed his pretty fist up his pretty ass in that nest— _berth_ he chose for him. He claws at the Force, makes himself shake the moment off.

‘I ordered already, I hope that’s ok?’ the redhead says, leading him towards the table. There’s wine there again, a red, and two glasses. ‘It should be here soon.’

‘That’s fine,’ he replies, following the omega. As they pass the couch Millicent looks up from where she’s snoozing, curled up in a small ginger ball on its back. Gold eyes watch him. Judge him. He contemplates extending his hand so she can sniff him again, but ultimately rejects it. She does not look that welcoming right now and he wants to make a better impression than the one he’ll make being clawed by Hux’s cat. 

They sit, the food arrives, and he’s pleased with what Hux has ordered for him, a rack of ribs from some medium sized mammal, roasted, with more root vegetables and this time a salad, and they eat, and they talk. Not about much to start with, and then about who to leave in charge if they have to retreat to their own quarters, and this time when Hux suggests Phasma he has no hesitation in agreeing. Mitaka comes up again and he sees no problem there, the Lieutenant seems hard working and is obviously loyal to his General, but he still has no one to suggest— until— ‘Perhaps Lieutenant Uskais? She is loyal, calm, practical, and as she is also a beta she is unable to go into season. She is, of course, part of your Guard, but—’ he trails off, waiting for Hux to respond. 

The redhead thinks for a moment before nodding. ‘She may be a good choice. Do you have any alphas that you feel you could trust? There are certain segments of the crew that will respond best to an alpha presence amongst the command, I’m afraid to say.’

The only two alphas he knows, if not knows all that well, are Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio and FN-1905— both of whom will be needed to guard Hux. ‘I’m afraid not.’

‘Ah!’ Hux sighs, running those long, pale fingers through his hair. ‘This is frustrating. I wish I could just trust everyone to behave! I feel like a nanny-droid some days.’

He nods, sympathetic. ‘This is when a droid army would be useful, programmed to obey.’

Hux laughs, sharp, a little rueful. ‘You are right. Maybe we were both wrong, forget clones, forget Stormtroopers, we should kill everyone and start again with an army of droids—’ the redhead takes a sip of his wine. ‘Though don’t misunderstand me Ren. I don’t mean it— though I know you are more than capable of carrying out the deed if it was required.’

‘I know you don’t,’ he sips his own wine, gaze flicking over to the cat as she delicately jumps down from her perch and comes over, rubbing herself against Hux’s ankles until he bends down and scoops her up onto his lap. ‘You are worried about them, I can feel it.’

‘Can you?’ Hux asks, picking out a small piece of white poultry from his stew and giving it to Millicent. ‘Through the Force you mean? What is it like?’

He thinks for a moment, trying to conceptualise what being able to access the Force is like. He can’t. He has no concept of what it’s like not having access to the Force so he can no more explain the difference than he could explain sight to a species without eyes. ‘I— It’s so much a part of me that I can’t explain, really, I could show you if you let me link our minds?’

‘Ah!’ Hux raises a hand instinctively, a rejection of the idea. ‘Thank you, but no. I would prefer not to.’

It feels like being slapped. For a moment he is two selves, one of which that wants to lash out like a child, to hurt Hux for this rejection, the other that understands, knows that to do such a thing Hux needs to trust him, and Hux still does not trust him. He hopes his face remains blank as he fights it out amongst himself, but eventually his better nature wins. ‘It’s fine,’ he says, even though it still stings a little. It really shouldn’t. The offer was made on impulse after all.

They fall to talking about inanities as they finish their food— he’s sure Millicent gets at least half the meat from Hux’s dish, but watching the redhead feed her, care for her, is compelling. Again the idea of a pup, a child, his and Hux’s, crosses his mind. The pup in Hux’s arms, plump and pale and with his own dark hair and eyes, and smelling of Hux’s milk— until the redhead suddenly says, ‘You grew up with a—’ a tiny frown on that pretty brow ‘—Wookie? Yes?’

He nods. ‘Yes, Chewbacca. Why?’

The redhead looks away, fiddles a little with the stem of his glass, before once more making eye contact. ‘What was it like? What was he like? Are they— you see, growing up— um. My father never permitted me near non-human lifeforms other than droids, and of course you know the First Order’s policies regarding non-humans, I just— from a rational perspective, and based on my own research, I suspect that a lot of what those policies are based on is non-factual. Irrational bias. Also there was Snoke. If I am correct I think he, himself, may have been a non-human— which makes him leading the Order somewhat ironic, don’t you think?’

He blinks. Hux seems honest and a careful brush of the omega’s mind shows his intentions fairly plain. The redhead has been contemplating the role of non-humans as part of the Galaxy going forward for quite some time, but under Snoke was unable to pursue the issue.

‘Chewie— Chewbacca— he was like an uncle. Like just another member of the family—’ he begins. Remembering— and then wondering for a moment why the Wookie was kept away from all those family dinners, before it occurs to him that it was probably his father’s doing. Chewbacca knew Han Solo too well, he doubts the Wookie would have let his father get away with his stupidity regarding his mother and Luke for very long, and if he knows anything about his father, he knows Han wouldn’t have wanted to be forced to confront his feelings about the matter. 

‘He shot you though?’ Hux interrupts. ‘Or at least I think he did. On Starkiller Base. That was a Bowcaster wound, and Bowcasters are traditional Wookie weapons if I am remembering correctly.’

‘Yes,’ his hand automatically goes to his side. The wound is long gone, it no longer hurts. The betrayal stings though. Not that he should feel betrayed, but his feelings have ever been disobedient. Chewbacca is still out there somewhere, thinking badly of him— ‘I had just killed my father in front of him. I suppose it was understandable.’

‘So he was loyal to your father?’ Hux asks, peering at him curiously. The redhead wants to know if non-humans are capable of human attachment, rationality, all the things his father and Snoke ever said they were not, and if it’s worth considering including them within the First Order .

‘Yes,’ he nods. It’s true. Anyway, he himself has no problem with non-humans, that side of things always seemed so very separate from himself and from his relationship with Snoke. The two of them were Sith, or at least wannabe Sith— he isn’t actually sure if his old master was actually a Sith Lord. How shameful. ‘He was loyal. Is loyal still, I suspect. And if you want to know if he is intelligent? He is. There’s no great difference between non-human and human intelligence in my personal experience.’

Hux contemplates for a moment, rolling his glass in his hand. ‘What do you think—’ the redhead begins, carefully, as though expecting to be slapped down for his audacity, ‘about non-humans? As possibly members of the First Order and a productive and valued part of our Galaxy once it has been conquered?’

He shrugs, ‘I have no problem with them. That was never one of my reasons for joining Snoke.’

The redhead nods, decisive, decision made, a whole new future opening up for the Galaxy— and then, with a slightly wicked curve to his lips asks, ‘Do you know what species Snoke was, because I am right, aren’t I? He was not human?’

All he can do is answer that he does not, though he is forced to agree with his General. He wonders what all those starched and stodgy sticklers for tradition that really don’t like non-humans thought about the issue, or did they just convince themselves that Snoke was human and be done with it

That night he begins his first real attempt at building a proper nest.

It’s harder than he thinks it should be, and partway through he has to stop, reload Gressidia Amdana’s holos for a reminder of the proper way to twist blankets to use them as part of strong side-walls— and then gets distracted for a while watching some of her others for reminders of other techniques and also for inspiration, but by the time he is ready to retire to his berth he has the basic framework completed under the baleful gaze of his grandfather’s helmet. This time he is trying to build a rounder nest with higher walls, a little based on nests from Naboo— sentimentality on his part— something with ample room for Hux to lounge at the rear of while he perches near the front in guard position, so he needs more space than the gap between berth and wall—except Darth Vader’s ruined helmet sits overlooking the best expanse of floor space that he has. It’s kind of — disconcerting, building a nest near the melted lenses that once covered his Grandfather’s eyes. It feels like the man, the alpha, is judging him. Did his grandfather ever build a nest for his grandmother? Did she see it and delight? What sort of nest would this man, this monster in the stories of much of the galaxy, this person whose mention would make Luke and his mother both smell of pain and sorrow, what sort of nest would he have built?

It doesn’t matter. The man, the alpha, is further removed from him than even his own father— dead long before he entered this life. He scoops up the helmet and raises it to eye level. Snoke had teased him with Darth Vader, promised him power like the man, promised him that he would become like the man, but at the same time Snoke had mocked him for his admiration, had grown to think him weak for relying on his constructed connection to his grandfather. His grandfather— he raises his other hand and runs a finger down the unmelted part of the helmet— this is not his grandfather. This is no one. This is just a mask like the mask of Kylo Ren. It’s funny, since he killed Snoke he hasn’t even thought of Darth Vader, hasn’t felt any burning yearning to be like the man or that he’s falling short of the legend. It’s almost like the comparison between the two of them was an idea planted in his mind by his former master—

What exactly was Snoke? _Does it matter._

He takes the helmet and puts it away in a cupboard. There’s no way he could show Hux a nest with Darth Vader overlooking it. The redhead would laugh at him.


	23. Chapter 23

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNING: This chapter deals with the attempted rape of a character other than Hux or Kylo, as well as looking a little into the psychology of the attempted rapist.
> 
> How are you all doing? I hope you're all well. Thank you, as always, for reading, leaving comments and kudos, and for making me feel appreciated as a writer. I wish to remind you all that I appreciate you in turn. I hope you all have a good rest of the week.

_’Ren!’ ‘Ren!’ ‘Ren! For fuck’s sake— are you asleep. If you’re asleep wake up!’_

‘What?’ he murmurs out, peeling open bleary eyes. ‘What’s—?’ That’s Hux’s voice. Not Hux’s voice mewling in pleasure— the redhead sounds distressed. Where is it coming from? He blinks, calling on the Force to help himself wake. He feels too hot. His dick is hard, burningly hard— he was dreaming. Long pale limbs. Long pale throat. Chasing lines of slick up long pale thighs. ‘What?’ Hux is comm-ing him.

He reaches for his comm, the small black button of a thing on his berthside table. ‘Yes, Hux.’

‘Lieutenant Mitaka has been attacked, please come to the Medbay,’ is all Hux says, distress obvious in his voice. 

‘On my way,’ he replies, dragging himself out of bed and scurrying about, dressing as quickly as possible. This time he remembers his armour.

He’s not sure what to expect. Has there been another assassination attempt? But no, Hux said Mitaka had been attacked not himself— 

He bolts through the halls, lightsabre in hand but not lit. It’s late, in the small hours and nowhere near a shift change, so the halls are almost completely empty, and those he passes quickly dart out of his way. There’s noise getting louder as he reaches the Medbay, voices, and with them the scent of distressed omegas, of blood, of spilled guts, the smell of an alpha in a great deal of pain. He enters the room carefully, assessing the situation. 

Hux’s hair is a mess from sleep, he’s barefoot and is in his pyjamas, all pale blue and crisp lines, but there’s blood on them. In his hand Hux holds a blaster. The redhead is furious. The stink of rage heavy in the air. Phasma smells of it too. She’s up and out of her berth, both her and Hux fretting over Mitaka. The dark-haired omega is conscious, but the fact he has been attacked is very obvious. His face and neck are badly bruised, and it looks like his arm is broken, a spiral fracture he’d guess from looking at it, as if someone has grabbed the limb and twisted it brutally up and behind him.

On the floor is an alpha, blaster wound to gut, another to hip and thigh, angled downwards as if someone has shot behind themselves in a confined space and without being able to see where they were aiming. On the man’s head is a helmet, a strange thing, red, at the front two very obvious air filters of the type that probably include pheromone scrubbers. The faint scent of excitement and arousal gone cold, soured, hangs in the air. Standing over the alpha are Ensign Uskais and FN-0945, blasters in hand, an ugly look of disgust on both women’s faces, mixed with confusion on the face of FN-0945. They were Hux’s guards for this night shift. 

‘What happened?’ he asks Hux, the redhead glancing over at him the moment he speaks. There’s something a little helpless in the omega’s gaze, something edging into despair, and anger there, and disgust. 

‘I’m sorry,’ the omega says. ‘I’m not sure why I comm-ed you. You told me to deal with this sort of thing myself—’

‘It’s ok,’ his gaze flicks from helmeted alpha on ground, to Mitaka— hurt and also obviously furious— back to Hux. He has a horrible feeling that he knows what has happened. ‘I was wrong to order you to deal with this by yourself. This sort of thing effects the whole pack. We should deal with it together, Dominant Alpha and Dominant Omega.’

A tiny flicker of gratitude crossed the redhead’s face, before the omega lurches over to the alpha— an officer he sees, an Ensign still in uniform— and kicks the man in the back, the side of him closest to the redhead. A muffled bellow of pain from the alpha, but not from Hux, even though the redhead is wearing no shoes. ‘This fuckstain attempted to rape Lieutenant Mitaka.’

Yes. He was right. He kneels down by the man’s side and reaches for the helmet, unlatching it against the alpha’s weak struggles. The face he sees beneath he doesn’t recognise, or at least not really— he thinks it might be one of the hangers-on, but one that’s never even been brave enough to approach Hux. One of the ones that lurks far in the background and watches with covetous eyes. 

‘What exactly happened?’ he asks, looking up from the alpha’s handsome-enough face to make eye-contact with Hux.

It’s Mitaka who answers, the dark-haired omega staring forward into nothingness, voice carefully level. ‘I left the bridge to go to the bathroom. On my way back I suddenly smelt an alpha, an alpha who smelt _strange_ somewhere close behind me, but before I could turn around he punched me in the side of the head and dragged me into a nearby conference room. I’m not sure exactly what happened then. I was dazed from the punch. I could hear him breathing, but it sounded muffled, like he was wearing a helmet, but not the same as if he was wearing a Stormtrooper one, more like you used to, Supreme Leader, when you were wearing your helmet. He smelt excited, aroused, _off_. I didn’t like it. He was behind me. I couldn’t see him, and if I tried to turn around he’d hit me. I can remember struggling, then he hit me a few times in the ribs, and the next thing I knew he was strangling me, but I managed to break his grip and go for my blaster, but he grabbed my arm and twisted it up behind me and I felt— heard— _felt_ things break and I dropped it, the blaster, but he had me pinned against the side of the table at that point, so I dropped it on the table in front of myself and managed to grab it with my other hand and then I just got it behind myself and shot twice and he fell.’ Mitaka sniffs, clears his throat, lifts his good hand up to wipe at the tears that have escaped to roll down his otherwise blank face. ‘Then I comm-ed Armitage.’

_Armitage?_

‘I came immediately,’ Hux says, running a gentle hand across the other omega’s dark hair, then letting Mitaka turn his bruised face and hide it against the redhead’s body. _Armitage is Hux?_ ‘I helped _Lieutenant_ Mitaka—’ from Hux’s mind he can read that the emphasis on the omega’s rank is designed to remind them all that the Lieutenant should not be simply reduced to what the rogue alpha attempted to do to him, ‘—here, to the Medbay, and had Ensign Uskais and FN-0945 drag that sack of filth with us, lest he recover enough to attempt to escape.’ That Hux had then comm-ed him is unsaid, as is the reality that Hux isn’t sure why he had, except Hux had found himself wanting his presence in this horrible situation. 

He will not let the redhead down. 

‘How badly injured is the Lieutenant?’ he asks, looking at Mitaka. The omega stinks of pain and shock, and still of anger, rage. Good. The anger is good. He hopes the omega stays angry. It’s when the anger fades that the pain can do the most damage. 

The redhead repeats the question, a demand at the Medidroid examining the dark-haired omega. They both listen to the response. Extensive bruising to much of his body, attempted strangulation, a concussion, a spiral fracture of the arm and dislocation of the shoulder— All the while the dark-haired omega they’re talking about keeps his face pressed against Hux.

When the Medidroid has finished its report he turns his attention back to the alpha cowering before him. ‘Why?’ he asks, though the answer doesn’t matter. There is no excuse for this kind of behaviour. 

The man spits blood at him. He hits him, hard, across the face, but doesn’t bother repeating the question when he can read the answer so close to the surface of the alpha’s mind. It’s a tangled confusion of thoughts and memories and impulses, like most minds, but like most minds he can decipher it. _There’s resentment there. There’s a lifelong othering of omegas, a reduction of them— not even to their reproductive purpose, but to their sexual. Their sexual potential that they refuse to share with this alpha— but at the same time there’re not a lot of memories of this alpha actually trying to court omegas, or even approaching them, talking to them, or even building nests. It’s as if he had assumed he would be rejected and instead of testing that hypothesis he had taken it as absolute fact._

_This is not the first time he has tried to rape an omega, but his earliest attempts— long ago, as a youth hunting the slums and backstreets of the city he grew up in, far away from the nice neighbourhood of his parents, looking for omega sex-workers and the destitute and the homeless and those just trying to make it home at night, long before he even joined the First Order— didn’t involve the helmet, so even though he’d managed to subdue some of the omegas their distress pheromones had meant his dick hadn’t worked. **Here there is frustration, violence, beating them when he couldn’t fuck them— killing one? The alpha to this day isn’t sure.** The memory scares and arouses the alpha all at once. He’d done what his parents had wanted and signed up to the First Order the next day— and then he’d been good. He’d tried to be good. He’d been scared of himself after he’d hurt that last omega— but he’d done research and worked out what had gone wrong— telling himself he only wanted to know how his body worked— and on the last trip planetside he’d bought the helmet— just because he liked the colour. He’d told himself that was all. Except he’d started fantasising about what he could do with it, but he’d still tried to be good, tried so very hard, and then all the omegas went into heat and he could smell them stinking up the place, and he’d thought maybe he’d have a go at winning a mate, but he could never bring himself to actually try, and it always seemed like they would mock him, were mocking him, and he had tried to be good. He had. Even though his memory is full of him jerking off with the helmet on, imagining what he could do with it, and watching the kind of porn mentioned on the message-board, the kind made with damaged alphas and sometimes drugged omegas, violent, often violent, so very violent in a way that always made his knot swell— _

_And this night the temptation had become too much for him, so he’d put the helmet on and gone wandering the halls, not even really planning to do anything, even though his heart hand been pounding in his chest and his mouth dry with excitement and his dick hard, so very hard, and he hadn’t picked out Mitaka, hadn’t chosen the dark-haired omega, Mitaka was simply the first omega he had encountered—_

He strikes the man again, gets up, disgusted, paces away. He wants to kill him. He should kill him. _What if the first omega he’d encountered had been Hux?_ a glance at the redhead, along with Phasma still doing his best to comfort Mitaka. _Hux would have killed the fuckhead._ He’s sure of it. And if he hadn’t— he looks to Mitaka, looks to Phasma, looks to Hux’s guards— yes. Hux has guards. Hux would have been safe. He would have been. He glances back at the alpha on the ground, the stink of him, death creeping closer. That gutshot had struck true, gone through his bowels. He should kill him now, why isn’t he? 

Because, on some stupid instinctual level, it doesn’t feel like his kill. This alpha has assaulted an omega of the pack, this is omega business. All he can do is support them. 

‘We should summon the crew for the execution,’ he says, attention on Hux, ‘With a wound like that he won’t live long, and I don’t think we should waste the Medbay’s resources on him.’

Hux nods. ‘Will you perform the execution, or do you wish me to?’ the omega’s thoughts are a tangle. On one hand if he does it he is placing the Dominant Alpha’s authority behind the notion that rape is unacceptable, but on the other hand Hux has been performing all these executions so far and it is appropriate to place such a role on the Dominant Omega— the one who usually has the most influence on pack morals. His glance goes to Mitaka then— but also if he and Hux are to leave the pack partially in the dark-haired omega’s hands for a while— 

‘Perhaps the Lieutenant should do it?’ he says. ‘He is the one who has been transgressed against.’

Hux seems surprised, but then a small smile slips over his face. He looks down at Mitaka and asks, ‘How do you feel about the Supreme Leader’s suggestion?’

The other omega thinks for a while, before glancing up at Phasma and then Hux, ‘I would prefer not to, if that is alright? It is not that I don’t think he deserves to be executed, but—’ he trails off.

‘You prefer not to kill?’ Phasma asks, and when he nods, a little ashamed, she leans down and presses a kiss to his brow. ‘That’s fine. It is fine, _isn’t it_?’ the latter a challenge to himself, even to Hux.

‘Of course,’ the redhead replies, looking a little helpless, as if the idea that someone might not want to kill a person who has tried to hurt them is beyond him. Good. Hux should show no mercy. If any transgress against Hux they must be destroyed.

He nods, replying to Mitaka. ‘Yes. That’s perfectly alright.’ He does not want to force an omega to do something they don’t want to.

After a moment Mitaka speaks again, a little haltingly, surprising him. He would have thought the omega would withdraw, but the dark-haired man seems to be pulling himself together, even of the stink of hurt and fear still lingers around him. ‘Based on our discussions Armitage, I do know why you might want me to do it, and I do have some suggestions considering I have declined. Perhaps we should call the execution before the Medidroids have healed me, so we can show the pack what this alpha has tried to do— to ensure as many of them as possible are outraged by his crime against one of the pack’s omegas. As I know you want to improve Captain Phasma’s status in the pack perhaps she should escort the prisoner— which will show, if nothing else, that she is recovering her strength. Then, I think _you_ should perform the execution Armitage, _General_ , but I also think there may be some benefit in having the Supreme Leader perhaps give a speech beforehand, and also definitely having him hand you the blaster with which you perform the duty. This will lend his power and legitimisation to what happens, and while I doubt it will entirely stop it from happening again, it may discourage some who would attempt it, and also encourage the pack to consider it to be unacceptable. We need them to know it’s unacceptable, at least now that Snoke is no longer Supreme Leader.’ 

That. His mind sticks on that— he follows the memory, sees so much fear and pain and frustration in the face of crime after crime that Hux had been forced to deal with alone, forced to punish the perpetrator with no help from Snoke, no backing from Snoke, no legitimisation from Snoke, sees Hux ranting to this Lieutenant, to Phasma, about trying to get the old Supreme Leader to condemn any act of rape or assault and the way the old bastard had always laughed or waved it off as if it was nothing. It’s unflattering to think of himself leaving Hux to deal with it just like his old master once had. No wonder so many of those in Hux’s faction don’t trust him. 

Lesson learnt. He will better in the future. 

Mitaka’s suggestions are sensible, so they carry them out, only giving the omegas enough time to dress properly before everyone is summoned to the vast, empty space of the flight deck, the holo-recorders are set up, and a message is broadcast through all ships that there is to be an execution and that everyone must witness it; even mates in their nests must watch on their nearest holo-projector. 

His own suggestion has Lieutenant Uskais join Phasma in escorting the alpha, dragging him really, badly injured and dripping blood and filth, in front of everyone. She is a beta, and one he is growing to trust, and beyond that a beta presence in this drama might help bring that faction around. 

Once the alpha has been deposited in front of everyone he steps forward and tells them of the man’s crime, gesturing to Mitaka to illustrate, and feels the wrath rise around him at the damage to the omega’s body, this insult to one of the most powerful omegas of the pack. He then holds up the helmet, shaking it, before flinging it to the ground and informing his pack that anyone caught with such a thing for such a purpose will soon experience exactly what this alpha is going to experience. He then condemns rape, all rape, not just the attempted rape of omegas by alphas— but the rape of alphas, betas, omegas, by alphas, betas, omegas. In his pack this will not happen and anyone who disagrees will be hunted down and prosecuted. 

Mitaka then speaks, speaks of trying to do his duty only to be assaulted, compelling empathy from the listening omegas, the betas, all those who have been attacked or fear attack, emphasising the negative impact of such violence on the pack as a whole, their capacity to do their duty. Once he is done the omega steps back, a waiting Medidroid bustling over to begin his treatment, which has the audience almost pulsing with sympathy and concern.

Then it is Hux’s turn, and the redhead steps forward, tall, imposing, almost a statue dedicated to righteousness. The omega confirms everything said before, speaks of his own disappointment— and that hurts the watchers, that they’ve disappointed their Dominant Omega, and it’s odd how much everyone has bought in to what’s happening, it’s like they are speaking to a unified pack, a healthy pack, a pack with one mind, if only until the moment ends— And everyone feels worse and becomes so much more outraged when the redhead speaks of the things happening out there in the Galaxy, the worlds still not under the control, the _protection_ of the First Order, the outrages being committed against omegas, against betas, even against alphas, their _suffering,_ and how, in this moment, Hux feels that maybe his First Order are no better— and they all cry out in minds and words against the idea, they will be better, they will all be better, things like this will never be permitted to come to pass, the First Order will not stand for the acceptance of rape— 

He steps forward, the blaster, Hux’s well used blaster, in hand, and holds it out for his omega to take. Hux takes it, the grip fitting so well in that long, pale hand— it feels strange and powerful and ceremonial, and he really does feel as if this is his pack, and he glories in the way the thoughts of the watchers resonate with his. _This is unacceptable. This will not be permitted. Omegas will not be treated like this by us. No one will be treated like this by us. We will take control of the Galaxy and ensure this will not go unavenged wherever it occurs._

Hux steps up behind the alpha, the man too injured to do much other than kneel there, the sense of his impending death coming over the alpha’s mind. The blaster rests against the back of his skull. The man gathers himself enough to say, blood foaming a little at the corner of his mouth, ‘Fuck you, you cun—’ Hux fires. The alpha dies. The pack roars in triumph.

Afterwards Hux retreats immediately to the Medbay with Phasma and Mitaka. He doesn’t join them, because Hux asks so very sweetly if they can have this time alone. Omegas tending to one of their injured number. He doesn’t protest. He walks the halls of the Finalizer and reaches out, sensing the mood of those around. It really does feel like a proper pack, it’s funny, a bit of bloodshed, him and Hux working together and seen to be working together, supporting each other, omegas seen to be respected, elevated to their proper rank in the hierarchy, and things suddenly feel so much less dysfunctional. Everywhere he goes he feels respect— for the most part. 

There are still some doubts, and there are some, ashamed, afraid that he will see their own fantasies, their own histories, that they too will be punished. He makes a note of every one of those he finds, and those in whose minds he can sense the memories of some real misdeed he knocks out and has transported to the brig to be dealt with later. Nonetheless the doubts are few and far between, and he feels comfortable amongst his pack, _his_ pack, for what must be the first time. 

Then he comes across her, the blonde and dark-eyed alpha who was admiring Mitaka so recently, Captain Pel-Nerra Ansolc of the _Conviction,_ her ship docked with the _Supremacy_ for repairs to its hull during the battle over Crait, destroyed at the time, her left without command, stationed on the Finalizer until she is assigned a new vessel. 

She is sitting on the floor of the hall, back resting against the wall. She looks the image of misery. He squats down next to her, her dark eyes look up, meet his own. ‘Thank you for standing behind them,’ she says, and then, banging her head back against the wall behind her, ‘Do you ever feel like you’re a monster, just because you’re an alpha?’

He doesn’t know how to answer that, because yes, he does feel like a monster at times, but no, he doesn’t think it’s just because he’s an alpha—

‘Do you want to spar?’ he asks her, wondering if violence will act the same panacea for her as it does at times for him. She looks at him for a moment, a small frown between her nearly invisibly blonde eyebrows, before a decisive nod. They go to his own training rooms. 

She’s strong, he’s forced to admit that pretty early on, strong and fast and a hell of a good fighter. He remembers her arrogance, her confidence that she’d win if she actually challenged him— she’s not quite that good, but she is good, very good. It’s thrilling. Alpha against alpha, not quite a matched fight, but close enough that if he didn’t have the Force she might just win if fortune was on her side, if he faltered, if she saw a moment of weakness and took advantage of it. But fortune and the Force _are_ on his side and eventually he gets the upper hand, gets her pinned, and she yields. 

After, they sit slumped on the training room floor and she says, ‘He’s lovely you know?’ She rolls her head so she can look at him. He can sense that she wants to talk, so he lets her, there’s no real reason he can see not to. He has found himself besotted by a lovely omega recently as well after all. ‘I set out intending to win the General— and before you start growling I’m smart enough to know when I’m beaten— but all that time I was on the bridge watching General Hux there _he_ was in the background. He’s quiet, he’s— it’s not exactly meekness, but he doesn’t seem to have that need to draw attention to himself all the time— and he’s smart, and he’s hard working, and he’s loyal. He’s like the perfect little omega from some gender-regressive drama— and usually that’s not my thing, I like them more fiery, more non-compliant—’ her eyes glaze for a moment and a barrage of memories of Hux at his best, fierce and bloodthirsty and _strong_ crosses her mind, and with it attraction and faint arousal, but then memories of Mitaka, quiet, studious, and the way he’d glanced at her, just once, as he’d walked past— not with desire, but as if he saw her and acknowledged her existence, but that his work was what was important, ‘— but still, he’s lovely. Absolutely lovely.’ A rueful smile crosses her lips, ‘Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not in love with him. It’s— attraction. A crush maybe. Too new to be anything more— but now that _bastard_ alpha has gone and ruined everything. I was still making up my mind, still determining if he was it for me, and now it doesn’t matter. He’ll never let me near him. He’ll never want another slathering, mindless alpha pressed against him. Fuck.’

Hux’s emphasis of “Lieutenant” comes to mind. Mitaka’s strength even after what had happened. The way all the omegas had focussed on the issue at hand, had not collapsed under the weight of the trauma of the incident— and even if they had in the moment, he now knows they would have pulled themselves together eventually, and any grief and pain and fear and anxiety they felt would be fully justified. He is sure that in time the trauma of what happened will just become part of who they are, who Mitaka is, not a defining feature, just part of a whole. ‘You’re being an idiot,’ he tells her, blunt. Before she can begin the offended diatribe he can see building up in her mind he continues with ‘If you really think he’s worth it, don’t define him by this moment. It’s true he might not trust alphas for a long while, it makes perfect sense after what has happened, but if you do decide you want him then you should respect him enough to let him decide if he wants you in return. Make yourself available to him, be kind to him, but don’t pressure him into anything— and if he smells distressed at your presence or seems unhappy because of you or tells you to fuck off then _fuck off,_ or else it won’t so much be me you have to deal with but _Hux._ ’

She blinks at him for a moment and then says, ‘You know, you’re not the sack-of-shit alpha I thought you were.’

And once he would have killed her for the comment, but he feels like a different man right now, a stronger man. ‘Thanks’ is all he says and then gets to his feet, helps her up, and she takes his hand perfectly comfortably, and she feels like pack, so they limp their way to the Mess Hall to eat breakfast together because this has been a very long night.


	24. Chapter 24

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNING: Some minor mentions of what happened to Mitaka last chapter, but also some discussion of domestic violence and the possible murder of a parent by the other parent.
> 
> The end of yet another week has arrived, I hope you all have had a good one. Thank you, as always, for reading, leaving kudos and comments, and for being such a lovely audience. I hope you enjoy this chapter as much as always.

He rests in the afternoon, gets up in the early evening, hopes that Hux will want to see him for dinner but isn’t sure if the redhead will still be in the Medbay with Mitaka. It’s a pleasant surprise when he’s summoned to the omega’s quarters to eat. 

Hux is pensive when he arrives. The omega’s uniform is lacking jacket, sleeves rolled up to the elbows, the very top button undone, hair a little dishevelled— as if his General has been running his hands through it. He looks lovely. The slight mussing of his usual neatness an erotic tease. It makes his dick throb, but he calls on the Force to quell it. Not today. Not after everything that’s happened.

‘I haven’t ordered,’ Hux greets him with, ‘I couldn’t think what to order. What a day. Fuck.’

‘What do you feel like?’ he asks, wishing he could reach out, to touch, to hold Hux, maybe comfort him   
‘A lot of alcohol?’ the redhead says with a rueful twist of his mouth, ‘but perhaps food would be a better idea. I don’t know. Order something for me, please, I can’t think right now.’

He agrees and then comms the kitchens, trying to think of what the redhead likes— but he knows, doesn’t he, what Hux really enjoys, from the conversation they had? Not what Hux usually orders, which is a practical combination of carbohydrates, protein, fibre, nutrients and micro-nutrients, but what Hux actually has taken pleasure in eating in the past. So he orders them both a white poultry curry, with boiled grains and several side dishes, and turns around to find the redhead has fished out a bottle of Corellian brandy. ‘Not my favourite,’ Hux says, nodding at the bottle as he pours them each a glass, ‘but Arkanisian is hard to get since my father destroyed most of the planet’s best vineyards in a fit of pique when we were forced to evacuate.’

He accepts the glass the omega hands to him and sniffs it, sips it, lets the fire of the alcohol tickle across his tongue and down his throat, carrying with it the taste of the fruit fermented and then distilled. Hux is watching him. _Armitage,_ and it’s the first time since he first heard the name that he’d has Hux in front of him with the time to contemplate this fact. Armitage. He longs to roll it over his tongue like the brandy. 

‘Thank you,’ the redhead eventually says. ‘For earlier. You handled things—’ one pink, plump lip is sucked in between teeth. ‘I appreciate it.’

‘It was nothing,’ he says and means it, feeling contempt for the man he was in the past. Isn’t this better? Yes. So much better. ‘How is he?’

‘Mitaka?’ Hux frowns, looks away. ‘The Medidroids have patched him up but they want him to stay at least overnight. He’s with Phasma right now, she’s watching over him—’ a small, helpless shrug. ‘He’s distressed, as you can imagine. I hope he’ll be ok in the long run— he— he is strong, I mean, we all have to be, don’t we? Strong or else we break—’ Hux seems to be staring into nothingness for a moment, before the redhead shakes it off. ‘I know I need to be there for him, but I’m not sure I’ll really get a chance. There isn’t much time now before the first pairs start to emerge.’

‘Phasma will be there for him,’ he reminds the omega, ‘And so will you as soon as you can be.’

‘I suppose—’ Hux says, trailing off. 

The food comes soon after, and they eat and confirm the idea of Mitaka, Phasma, Lieutenant Uskais being left in command, but there’s nothing new to say there. No one new to add, and the time is coming quickly, the days being eaten up, and he knows he’ll be ok, because even if he has to retreat to his rooms if anyone comes after him they’ll find an angry, frustrated, alpha deep in rut and strong in the Force— but Hux— _what if he goes after Hux in that state?_ No. No, he won’t. The redhead said they’ll still not be mindless, and as long as he has a mind he will do everything in his power to protect his omega. Even from himself.

After they’ve eaten they retire to one of the fatly padded couches, more Corellian brandy in hand. It seems like the very moment they sit Millicent strolls into the room from the berthroom, delicately jumping up onto the couch between them. She gives him a look, almost contemplative, and it must be the brandy that gives him the confidence to extend a hand and let her sniff it. She does, and then she steps forward and rubs the side of her face across his fingers. Her fur is so soft. She’s actually purring. He lets himself pet her, lets himself rub at the velvet smooth patch of extra fine fur behind her ear. She indulges him for a moment before just as suddenly turning away and delicately climbing into a contemplative Hux’s lap for more pets. The redhead obliges, almost trained to give affection when she desires it. 

‘Have you ever been with an omega?’ the redhead asks, making him choke on the next sip of brandy. It burns, makes his eyes water, makes him act a fool as he tries to clear his fire riddled airway. Why is Hux asking this now?

He shakes his head before managing to croak out ‘No.’

The redhead nods. He reaches out, brushes the omega’s mind, but his General’s surface thoughts all seem to be on the alpha who attacked Mitaka. Full of rage and disgust and fear. ‘How about a beta?’ the omega asks.

‘No I—’ he doesn’t actually want to answer this. Hux will laugh at him. Hux will— should he trust the redhead? He should. Will he? Maybe it’s too late now. ‘—I haven’t actually been with anyone. My life— the way I’ve lived it. It hasn’t entirely been conducive to— you know.’

The redhead doesn’t laugh. Contemplative, the omega sips at his brandy, pets his cat. ‘I’ve never let myself. Not with anyone. Well, I never did want to with anyone but alphas and I always— I would remember what they were like, my father’s alpha friends, and all the horrible things alphas have said to me over the years— I was always afraid that if I let myself, they’d turn out to be just like that alpha I executed earlier—’ what can he say to that, he can hardly promise that they wouldn’t, and it doesn’t seem the right moment to insist that at least _he_ wouldn’t, and part of him— no, no point kidding himself. He as an _entirety_ is glad no one has gotten their foul, unworthy hands on Hux. The redhead tilts the glass, swallowing the last tiny sip, before placing one hand on his cat to steady her as he sits up and reaches for the bottle. Millicent remarkably doesn’t complain, or scratch, or bite, she just lies there, content, purring. 

As the omega is pouring more brandy he continues on, ‘—it doesn’t help that I’ve been so sheltered. Almost all the alphas I’ve ever met have been members of a certain class— the same class as almost all of our officers. You must know the type by now. Most of them have been raised with a very concrete idea of gender roles— hence Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio’s personal torments— and the best I could ever hope from one of them would be a kind of patronising, paternalistic, affectionate contempt. Not what I was searching for. I know alphas, or at least some alphas, born of different classes and from families that would not rush in to join up with the Empire reborn are supposedly different—’ those pale eyes meet his as Hux offers him the bottle, he holds out his glass, lets the redhead refill it, ‘—have you found that to be the case, in your experience outside the First Order?’

He thinks immediately of his father. His father’s treatment of his mother, Luke— there was certainly something paternalistic, something patronising, there— ‘Yes, and no. I think it’s simply that alphas in the rest of the Galaxy are more varied than the ones you described. Some are just like that, but others— I don’t want to be like that myself. I don’t think I ever did—maybe that’s one of the reasons I’ve always been so uncomfortable with what was expected of me as an alpha.’

Hux huffs out a little laugh, sips the brandy. ‘No. No you are turning out to be a very different alpha than I expected.’ A tiny little smile on the redhead’s lips. ‘I like it. Keep it up.’

‘Oh, I will!’ he promises, immediately. He can feel his face flush and doesn’t think it’s just the alcohol. There’s something odd in the air, something sweet and thick and syrupy between them. He doesn’t know what it is though. He does feel comfortable, close to Hux in a way he hasn’t before, like he could almost reach out and touch and the omega wouldn’t shoot him for his presumptuousness. 

So of course he has to ruin everything by bringing up the redhead’s mother. Because it’s been bothering him, the sad woman from Hux’s memories. ‘Your mother was an omega wasn’t she?’

The sweetness in the air sours, but Hux doesn’t withdraw from him. Smelling of sorrow and distress the redhead replies, ‘Yes. She worked in the kitchens. I don’t think Brendol actually gave her a choice— he just took what he wanted from her, then took me from her, then took us both from Arkanis—’

‘What happened to her?’ he asks when it’s clear Hux has trailed off. 

A gulp of the brandy and Hux says, ‘I don’t know. I was about sixteen, stationed on another ship, and I had leave so I visited— not _him,_ I wanted to see _her_ — and she was just gone. Vanished as if she’d never been—’ the redhead’s face seems to be struggling to remain impassive, lower lip quivering a little, but still the omega doesn’t let himself cry even though the air is almost unbreathable with his pain— then anger. So much anger. ‘He wouldn’t tell me what had happened. He wouldn’t tell me if she’d finally escaped him, or he’d gotten sick of her and dumped her planetside somewhere, or if he’d killed her—’ Hux’s eyes meet his own, that pale gaze burning into him. ‘I always suspected it was the latter. You know, I’d already decided I would kill him one day, but that— that accelerated things.’

‘You loved her?’ he finds himself asking. 

A tiny frown on the redhead’s face. ‘I suppose I did, I just never let myself acknowledge it. It hurt, a lot, when she was gone.’ A single tear escapes, before Hux lifts a hand and rubs it roughly from his face. ‘Sorry, this is unnecessarily emotional of me.’

‘I loved Luke,’ he says, because now seems the right time to say it, admit it, perhaps the only time that will ever be. ‘I loved him a great deal, and my father, and I still love my mother, but Luke— Luke was special to me. Kind to me. Good to me.’

‘What happened?’ Hux asks, frowning. ‘If you want to talk about it?’

‘He tried to kill me,’ he looks down into the amber pool at the bottom of his glass. ‘I was asleep and I woke up with him standing over me, lightsabre in hand, my death in his eyes—’ he sips from the glass, thinking of the best way to say the rest of it. ‘I— reacted. I pulled my hut down on his head and then— things get blurry after that. I killed— I killed so many of my fellow students, and the others, the others I brought with me to Snoke— but I don’t think all of that is the point. That’s not what’s been bothering me.’

‘What has then?’ Hux asks, leaning towards him, pale eyes on him, no judgement there. 

‘When I woke up with him standing over me the hut was filled with the Dark Side— so thick it was almost as if it had pushed out all the air. He didn’t feel like himself, not in his mind and not in the Force, and he didn’t smell like himself— I think— and it’s only recently I have thought this, only since I killed Snoke— I think that he, Snoke, might have interfered with my uncle’s mind. Used the Dark Side to control him, just for a moment, just long enough to push me into doing what he wanted—’

‘Fuck,’ Hux hisses. ‘That’s— I don’t know what to say to that. It’s— horrible. Unforgiveable.’

He looks away. ‘I don’t want you to say anything, I just— I guess I want to be able to tell someone.’

There’s a pause, and then Hux asks, voice small. ‘Do you regret it? Joining Snoke? Joining the First Order?’

A good question. He puts the glass down on the grey glass of the coffee table and turns fully face Hux, pretty Hux, lovely Hux, Hux with Millicent curled up like a baby on his lap— ‘I was never going to be the man they wanted me to be. I was never going to be able to keep away from the Dark Side. I don’t think I regret that this is where I’ve ended up— and I’m sorry for the fact I’m going to bring it up even though you don’t want me to just yet— I’m not sorry I met you. I’m not sorry to have fallen in love with you— and I never would have if I hadn’t joined Snoke— but I wish it had been my choice instead of his manipulations. I wish it had been— it’s almost like I wish we’d encountered each other and immediately connected and then decided to make something together, a better future, the kind of better future you have to be willing to wallow in the blood to build— and not because some pathetic little Darksider decided to play head games and had the strength to carry it off.’ 

He also wishes there’d been some way he could have brought Luke along with him, brought him into the fold, kept his uncle’s love and all that kindness and everything that had just ended up wasted hiding from the Galaxy for all those years. He is sad, sorry, that that’s what Luke’s life had ended with, instead of the man being heart of a pack, with mates who loved and appreciated him. If only there was a universe in which he could have both Hux and Luke— Luke as his surrogate parent, not Luke as a mate, he is not his father— and perhaps that is all that was, the son mirroring the father’s feelings. He’ll never know now. 

‘I—’ Hux begins, blinking, the blush caused by alcohol getting darker on those pretty cheeks. ‘I—’ The redhead swallows, takes a deep breath. ‘Thank you, Ren.’ There’s a pause, and then Hux is saying ‘I hated him, you know?’

‘Who? Snoke?’ he asks, frowning at the redhead, thinking of the way the omega had always been with the old Supreme Leader— and jealousy sparks, the way Hux had crawled up to Snoke— but then he remembers Mitaka’s memories, Hux’s endless frustrations.

‘Yes,’ a bitter little smile. ‘He was just another, stupid, short-sighted, ego-maniacal knot-head. Not so different from my father.’ Hux snorts out a breath of disgust, ‘ _Build a better Death Star,_ that’s what he ordered me to do— of all the stupid ideas. I did it, of course, and I did it better than anyone in the Galaxy could have done, and she worked beautifully, didn’t she? My Starkiller. But still, honestly—’ Hux sips the brandy, rolling it across his tongue. ‘There were times— if I hadn’t thought the New Republic and the Resistance so utterly corrupt and self-serving— there were times I almost contemplated sending them vital information that would have seen to his downfall—’ it’s unbelievable, He doesn’t believe it for a moment, but he can feel the truth of the sentiment, and then Hux is talking again, ‘Unfortunately it would have seen to the downfall of the entire First Order, and I couldn’t have that.’

‘I wouldn’t have guessed you hated him so much,’ he muses, shocked. He’d never bothered reaching into Hux’s mind in the past, back when Snoke was still alive, not past the surface intensity, that drive to destroy his enemies clouding deeper thoughts.

‘Oh, I did what I had to,’ Hux says, rueful, a little ashamed of himself. ‘Played the sycophantic, pathetic little omega— like you do with alphas like that, the ones that are stronger than you, the ones that can obliterate you with the click of their fingers, when you know if you don’t they might— not just kill _you,_ but destroy your entire pack and everything you’ve worked for.’ And Hux couldn’t bear the thought of the First Order falling just because he couldn’t play the fool, humble himself in an alpha’s eyes. ‘All the while plotting, planning, hoping one day they’ll just drop dead or luck will be on your side and conditions will be ripe for one of your assassination plans—‘ a little laugh, ‘and then you killed him. Just like that. And I wasn’t prepared for it, I wasn’t. In none of my scenarios you broke free of his control and took him down. I was— impressed. Angry with you, but impressed. And afraid. I thought you were going to be just another him, “the Supreme Leader is dead, long live the Supreme Leader”— I was wrong. I’m sorry.’

‘Don’t be,’ he insists, shame thick burning in him. He’d hurt Hux then, the first act he’d committed in his new role. Fuck. How can the redhead stand talking to him so intimately? He has been a monster. ‘I wasn’t much different after all— Not until I decided I had to be. If you want to thank anyone, you should thank yourself for that.’

Hux blinks, then a soft, sweet feeling suffuses him, even though the redhead is trying to fight it off. ‘Many an alpha has promised they’d change,’ the redhead says, ‘Few actually carry it through. I think the credit is yours Ren.’

He feels himself flush, embarrassed and pleased. 

It’s not long after that that he retires to his rooms, leaving Hux almost reluctantly, something like that sweet, syrupy aura of earlier returning to their interactions at the end. As he walks down the hall towards his own rooms he finds himself glancing back, startling when he catches Hux watching him leave, Millicent flopped in the redhead’s arms. For a moment he feels captured, pleasantly trapped in that pale gaze, before Hux averts his eyes and goes back inside his rooms and then he feels like an idiot under FN-1923 and FN-1905’s ever so slightly judgemental gaze.

When he returns to his rooms he works on his nest for several hours, re-watching snippets of the holos to guide him in shaping and perfecting it, until he can finally stand back and look and see something he is actually proud of. Something that might actually impress an omega. Oh wouldn’t Hux look lovely lounging in it, waiting for him? _Soon,_ he promises himself.


	25. Chapter 25

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another week, another chapter- I hope you all had a great one, week that is. Thank you all, as always, for reading, commenting, leaving kudos, bookmarking the fic, subscribing- and all the ways you make me feel so appreciated!

Captain Ansolc plops herself down next to him while he’s eating breakfast in the Mess Hall. This attracts some looks, but a smirk and cocky tilt of her head and everyone turns their attention back to their food. ‘Any news about how he is?’ she asks, letting thick porridge dribble from her spoon back into her bowl.

‘I’m sorry,’ he shakes his head. ‘I’ve heard nothing today.’

‘Ah,’ she sighs, dropping the spoon. ‘Being an alpha is hard. You spend your whole life running around wanting to fix things— but not everything can be fixed, and even the things that are fixable can’t always be fixed by you.’ He nods, though in truth a lot of his life has been spend running around trying to break things instead of fixing them. ‘You want to spar again after this?’ she asks after a moment. ‘I feel like I’m crawling out of my skin, can’t settle to anything.’ Her mind is full of Mitaka and the desire to do his attacker violence, but the alpha is dead and she doesn’t even know the omega enough to even be allowed to visit him in the Medbay to see how he is personally. 

‘I have a training session with Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio and FN-2037,’ he says, but then considers. ‘You can join us if you’d like, some of your moves could be well adapted to FN-2037’s fighting style.’

‘FN-2037—’ she muses, ‘Wasn’t there some drama about him and an alpha? He’s a beta, isn’t he?’

‘Is that going to be a problem?’ he asks her, except it’s less of a question and more of an unspoken threat of what will happen if it is going to be a problem.

She snorts out a laugh. ‘No. That stuff’s so stupid. Society as a whole is far too keen to judge about things that are none of its business and aren’t effecting pack functionality.’ She looks away for a moment, and in her mind he can read a history of irritation and outrage and need to prove herself and to do her family proud because— ‘My parents were both alphas, you know? Rare, but it does happen. And because my father was male and my mother was female and I existed everyone just looked at them and seemed to decide that the only way they could cope with the notion of them as mates was if they treated my mother like a beta or an omega or something, anything, other than an actual alpha— so, yeah, as far as I can see society can go fuck itself and if FN-2037 wants to chase alpha cock then good for him.’

She actually means it.

So she comes with him to the training rooms, and he gets to see Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio puff up and get uncomfortable, because the Lieutenant has heard about her parentage and doesn’t know how he feels about seeing the concrete evidence of the existence of a functional alpha-alpha pairing wandering about without the slightest bit of shame. Which isn’t to say he’s prejudiced against her, it’s more that he wants, so badly, to be able to have what her parents have, but seeing her makes him uncomfortable, because he has been conditioned to be uncomfortable, and also makes him envious and also very much ashamed because of his sense of his own cowardice, and it also makes him question, just for a moment, his current feelings for FN-2037— a beta when he has never desired a beta before— but he does desire FN-2037, and more than desires him, likes him, likes him a very great deal— he then gets to watch the Lieutenant puff up even more when the Captain notices exactly how good-looking FN-2037 is and then proceeds to flirt with him, not seriously— as her mind is still full of Mitaka— but at first more out of reflex at seeing a pretty face, and then out of her enjoyment at annoying the Lieutenant. 

Before it can progress to a formal challenge that might end in a fatality he gets the two to spar, and it’s a glory to see, alphas at their best, thanks to all the training the Lieutenant fighting even better than he had back when the other alpha had challenged him. They are fast, vicious, powerful— the Captain a little faster, a little smarter, a lot more practiced, the Lieutenant stronger, fiercer, his rage releasing the shackles his sense of duty often place around him, stopping him from fighting dirty, from fighting cruel— the Captain wins, but it’s a near thing. 

Standing beside him while they fight is FN-2037, smelling of worry and concern but also in a pleasant, sandalwoody way of arousal from watching their strength. The beta is observing their moves, assessing them, judging them, determining which ones he might be able to use himself— but he doesn’t want to linger too long in the Stormtrooper’s thoughts, because the beta can’t help intermittently imagining what he’ll do with Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio later, and every now and then the image flashes across his mind of an alarmingly large, double ended knotting dildo that he intends to purchase the moment the fleet is no longer in communications lock-down.

‘Well, they’re a cute couple,’ she says, once the training session has stopped and Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio and FN-2037 have retreated, doing their best to appear as if they are going to go their separate ways and not creep back to one of their rooms and return to their fantasy of being wrapped around each other while an alpha knots each in turn. 

‘I would appreciate it if you didn’t spread it around the ship,’ he warns her, thinking of the Lieutenant’s brittle-ness, FN-2037’s still ever-present hurt. ‘I don’t think either of them want anyone knowing right now.’

‘Oh, I wouldn’t,’ she says, hands up. ‘I don’t like making trouble for people.’ Another thing he can read is true in her mind. 

‘You should join us again,’ he says as he prepares to return to his rooms to bathe before lunch. ‘Not just with them, but with the others. You’re a good fighter.’

‘Not as good as you,’ she says with a rueful shrug. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever fought an alpha as good as you— not even my mother. You’ve got that instinct, that drive for it. It’s like you were made to be a Dominant Alpha.’

That just might be one of the nicest things anyone he doesn’t really know has ever said to him, and the thing is that she means it, he can read the honesty in her mind. Her opinion of him has vastly changed in the last couple of days, and she’s still reeling from it, but she feels so much more content in her pack as a member of the First Order than she can remember feeling, and it’s making her slightly soppy and emotional.

After bathing Hux comms him to say the redhead will be eating lunch in the Medbay, and does he want to join? He does. He wants to see the omega, but he also wants to see how Mitaka is doing. 

The dark-haired omega seems subdued when he arrives, the smell of distress still hanging around him, duller and heavier than before. The Lieutenant’s mind is foggy, distracted by going back and forth over everything that happened between him leaving the Bridge to go to the bathroom and shooting the alpha that attacked him, wondering what he did wrong, wondering how he attracted the alpha’s attention, wondering if he’d done something to upset the alpha, wondering if he could have avoided being attacked, wondered if he could have escaped the alpha’s clutches earlier— 

Phasma and Hux both seem to desperately want to fix the situation, hovering over Mitaka— who is starting to find their fussing irritating, and even Millicent has climbed into the dark-haired omega’s lap as if to try and soothe him. It’s probably not his place to say anything, but unlike everyone else in this room he actually knows what the alpha was thinking, so he grabs a chair with the Force and drags it over to the Lieutenant’s berthside and takes a seat.

‘It wasn’t your fault,’ he begins with, ignoring Hux and Phasma’s combined outraged snarls of “Of course it wasn’t his fault!” ‘He had attacked omegas before, he would undoubtedly have attacked more omegas in the future, and if he hadn’t run into you he would have found someone else that night because he was looking for an omega to attack, any omega— it had nothing to do with you personally. You did nothing to attract his attention. You did nothing to call this situation on yourself. And I have no doubt whatsoever that you handled yourself as well as anyone could in that situation. There is nothing you could have done differently that would have resulted in a better outcome, and I think I speak for the General and the Captain as well as myself when I say that any outcome that had resulted in your death would have been totally unacceptable.’ 

‘How do you know it wasn’t my fault?’ the Lieutenant asks, dark eyes fixed on his own. ‘How do you know any of that?’

‘Because I took it from his mind with the Force,’ he answers simply, and he can tell it’s not enough to automatically convince the omega, but it is enough to seed some doubt into the self-condemnatory spiral exhaustion and emotional processing is leading him down. 

‘I’m so tired,’ the dark-haired omega says after a minute, shaking his head back and forth, one hand clawing up into his hair. ‘I can’t sleep. I feel like he’ll be waiting for me, like he’ll get me if I do. By the Gods I’m so pathetic.’

‘You’re not pathetic.’ Hux insists, and then, voice very serious, ‘He’s dead— and even if he wasn’t— we’re here, Phasma and myself, we wouldn’t let him.’

‘Are you sure you don’t want the Medidroids to give you something?’ Phasma suggests, tone clear that this has been discussed before and rejected. ‘Just to help you sleep?’

‘No,’ the Lieutenant’s scent of distress gets stronger. ‘I want to be able to wake up if something happens.’

They argue back and forth a bit, both Phasma and Hux convinced that Mitaka will feel better when he sleeps, Mitaka afraid to do so—

‘I could use the Force to help you to sleep,’ he has done it before, after all, and he can do it more gently than he did to Rey. ‘You will wake up naturally if something happens, fully alert, unlike with sedatives.’

After a moment’s indecision, mind flickering over all the terrible things that could happen, exhaustion gets the better of Mitaka. ‘All right, as long as you promise I’ll be able to wake up.’ 

‘I promise,’ he says, getting to his feet and standing over the dark-haired omega. Both Hux and Phasma smell wary, but there’s something in the redhead’s eyes— something that he will have to wait to decipher. He reaches out, gently, so very gently, and brushes across Mitaka’s mind, easing it towards sleep, easing it away from bad dreams and into peaceful rest. One long, slow blink, and Mitaka succumbs, and he reaches out and cushions the omega’s collapse back onto the cushions of the berth and rearranges the man until he knows the omega is comfortable, and then he pulls away. 

Hux glances at Mitaka, nose twitching as he scents the other omega, and then the redhead looks back at him. ‘Thank you.’

‘It’s nothing,’ his own gaze lingers for a minute on the Lieutenant, now sleeping peacefully. He thinks he can remember strangling the omega at some point in the past with the Force— how could he do that? How cruel, how outrageous, of him. No wonder the Lieutenant has been afraid of him, afraid but still doing his best to deal with him— Mitaka is very brave, very commendable. Such an important part of their pack— he will not attack the man again. He will not be that version of himself ever again. ‘I’ll go now, it’s best if he has some peace or he might wake again.’

Hux nods. ‘I’ll see you later?’

‘Of course.’

That afternoon he wanders into the officer’s training rooms to discover Captain Ansolc has collected most of the remaining single alphas from the ship that have even the slightest doubts about him as Dominant Alpha— and at first he feels betrayed, thinks she’s intending to gang up on him— but that’s not what he reads from her mind. She’s an alpha and she likes him now and as an alpha the best way she can think of getting the other alphas that doubt him to like him also is if they all have a brawl. _A brawl for training purposes_ is how she puts it, not to the death, unless the death is unavoidable. 

It’s not like he can refuse, with his heart pumping in his ears, and his body puffing up and his head dropping forward and the want of it, the want of violence, ringing through him like a gong. He keeps enough of a mind to organise how this is going to happen— four teams, each team against all of the other three, the winner the team with the last alpha standing— if you’re down yield, don’t keep fighting— with no reward except knowing how strong you are in relation to the rest of the alphas here— and what better reward for an alpha? 

For fairness’ sake they get a nearby commstech to use the ship’s computers to randomly assign them to their teams, and the moment it’s done they’re off. They’re fighting, bare knuckled, and he doesn’t even reach for the Force, and it’s _glorious._ Captain Ansolc is not on his team but knows, in that cocky way she seems to have, that she is the strongest alpha on her team, so she immediately goes after him to try and take him out. They grapple, she gets a brutal elbow strike to the scarred side of his face, and then he gets that arm in his grasp and twists it, but she twists with it and drops down and actually kicks his feet out from under him. He catches himself as he goes down, kicking out and catching her in the back of the knee as she tries to stand, and then that’s her down too, and they grapple for a bit until he gets the upper hand— but while they’ve been distracted fighting members of the two other teams they’re not a part of have decided to team up and try and take them both down, so somehow he finds himself working _with_ her to fight them off, and then they get separated and don’t face off again to the very end of the brawl, when it’s just him, her, and another alpha, the older dark-skinned male that she had been competing against that day on the bridge— and they all know that alpha’s the one who’s going to be eliminated first, because his ribs and one arm are busted and he’s got a concussion, but he’s grinning with bloody teeth, and they all feel it, the joy of this moment, alphas as part of a pack, all of them strong, and him proving himself as a worthy Dominant Alpha. 

Still, before yielding, the dark-skinned alpha manages to get Captain Ansolc down and breaks her arm, even if she reverses the situation and gets him pinned moments later. Then it’s just the two of them, and he’s hurt and bruised and bloodied, but he knows he’s not as badly injured as she is, and he knows he has the most stamina— because there were times when Snoke would make him train and train and train for days without rest, until the world went bleary and he couldn’t help throwing up, and until the only thing keeping him standing was the Dark Side. 

They rush each other and it’s over in moments, he gets a hand on her neck and forces her down, and then pins her and she yields, laughing, joyous, and they both collapse onto the training mat with the rest of the alphas, the alphas of his pack— and they all breathe, and they all feel it, the connection between them all.

Eventually he summons some Medidroids to tend to their injuries, because there’s no way he’s letting this rabble storm into the Medbay to disturb Mitaka, and they insist he goes first in the way he should as their strongest and fiercest warrior, in case the pack is attacked and he is needed, so he sits there and lets the Medidroid fix him, accompanied by a low drone of irritated binary— the droids sick of fixing alphas who go out and get themselves injured for no good reason— and he feels good. He feels strong and powerful and in his place and it’s wonderful, and he longs to tell Hux all about it.


	26. Chapter 26

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short chapter I'm afraid. I have a cold and have spent the last two days coughing- ugh. My sympathy goes out to any of you who might also be sick. Let's hope we feel better soon.
> 
> As always I'd like to thank you all for reading, commenting, leaving kudos and all the ways you make me feel appreciated! I wonder what you'll all think of this chapter.

It happens just after he’s gotten out of his shower, again, like before. He’s naked, water dripping down his skin from his still wet hair, body pleasantly tired from fighting, dick hard from imagining running his hands—big, strong, calloused— over the silk-smooth skin of Hux’s thighs and ass and his and waist while crowding the omega against the wall of the shower. He’s intending to jerk off— not even to porn. He’s going to lie on his berth and play with his knot and imagine he’s snuggled up in his nest with his redhead—

It’s pressure at first, like his ears are about to pop. He works his jaw, looking around. This is familiar— but the familiarity doesn’t crystalize until he hears her. 

‘A-ah.’ It’s a faltering exhale, and when he whirls around he sees her, eyes-wide, and sees the way they dart to his hard dick and away, embarrassment suffusing every sense of her. He darts for his discarded robe, grabs it off the floor, holds it over his dick and hopes the fucking thing starts to soften soon. ‘I shouldn’t have—’ she mutters, face bright red. 

‘Why did you?’ he demands, and all of a sudden he’s furious. How dare she come here and disturb him after she _rejected him_ the way she did.

‘I—’ he sees her eyes dart to his now covered dick and away, hears her swallow hard. ‘I— You. Um. You— We.’ She takes a deep, steadying breath. ‘Can you please put that robe on, not just hold it there?’ and it’s so much like the past, the mirror of another interaction, and he feels himself torn. All of a sudden he’s looking at her and he can’t deny the fondness he feels. He can’t deny the connection they had— even if it was only one forged by Snoke. 

‘Turn around and I will,’ he says, complying when she does so. It feels weird to redress in the sweaty, grimy robe, the stinking fabric sticking to his still-damp flesh. He’ll have to bathe again, before he sees Hux— At least his dick is subsiding, though the thing is being obnoxiously recalcitrant to return to full softness. ‘You can look now.’

She turns back, hesitant, and his stupid rut-brain reads it as flirtatious— like an omega doing that play-ignoring thing, demanding to be impressed. His dick twitches again. Fuck. He feels so confused— he’s honestly stopped expecting to feel her like this again.

‘Luke is dead,’ she says.

And he says, ‘I know.’

But she’s still talking. ‘And we haven’t heard anything from you in weeks— it’s like the First Order has just vanished— and I wondered—‘ she bites her lip, plump pinkness pulled in between white teeth— and he thinks of Hux, his omega, and he feels—he doesn’t know what he feels. ‘— I wondered if you’d changed your mind, if you wanted to come back to us?’

He looks at her, eyes wide and welcoming, and for a second he imagines fucking her— burying his knot in her tight cunt— and the thrill doesn’t come. He pictures the omega from the porn, the one with his fist up his ass, and in his mind tuns it into Hux— wanting him. Welcoming him inside. Oh. Oh. And maybe he already knew it, but the time for him and her, the time they ever could have been together— it’s passed. It was over the moment he looked at Hux and saw something he wanted for himself. He laughs, shakes his head. ‘Never.’

She jerks back, almost as if the word is a slap in the face. ‘Why? I still don’t understand why you could choose—’ her face scrunches up, angry, ugly, ‘The _First Order_ over me, over your mother?’

He looks at her. She’s pretty, and above all she’s young. Last time he hadn’t realised how much older than her he is. ‘You are naïve,’ he says. ‘A child. What does your side actually have to offer me?’

He can see the words “we’re not the bad guys” almost escape, but she bites them back. ‘I’ve been thinking about it and I’m not wrong, we had a _connection._ ’

‘It was Snoke, nothing more,’ he tells her, and it’s true and it’s not true. It was Snoke, but he’d been so lonely, so desperate to feel something, part of something, that it had been easy to give himself into it, but now— now he is part of a pack, properly part of a pack, and he’s never going to be lonely again.

‘Do you really believe that?’ she asks, and he can see the anger in her getting roused. He’s not acting the way she wants, not giving her what she’s after, and she doesn’t like it. She has always been so terribly stubborn. 

Does he? Of course not, but that was then and but he’s not going to expose his soft underbelly to her again. The last time he made himself vulnerable to her she had just walked away. It’s hypocritical of her to be standing in front of him now, whining about the connection she so easily discarded. ‘Yes I do. I feel nothing for you.’ Next to nothing—not quite, but nothing compared to what he feels for Hux. 

‘I don’t believe you,’ she says, stepping in closer to him even though their physical forms are so far away. ‘And I know you don’t believe it either. I thought if I gave you time you might come around. Surely you have to know you’re on the wrong side. The First Order are _monsters._ ’

He’s shaking his head, stepping away from her, before the thought of Hux, of Phasma, of Mitaka, of Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio and Ensign Uskais and Captain Ansolc and FN-2037 and FN-0954 and FN-1923 and FN-1905 and all the others whose minds he’s touched, all those individual personalities and memories and experiences and motives and preferences and pain— How dare she. Just dismiss them out of hand. The arrogance of her— only made worse because it’s a mirror of his own arrogance in the past. His own dismissal of his pack, as if they were nothing. A thing he was totally detached from. ‘Yeah, well I’m a monster too, and I’m a monster happy amongst my own kind. Go away Rey, I don’t want you anymore.’

‘But you did once?’ she asks, looking young and vulnerable— and he has no idea what she’s actually thinking. He can’t read her, she’s blocked her mind from him. 

‘I didn’t think you were this pathetic,’ he sighs and watches her flinch, watches the rage rise in her eyes. In the tangle of his emotions all he can think is that he wants her gone, he doesn’t want to have to deal with this, he wants Hux and his pack and not to feel, not to have _felt,_ anything at all for her— maybe that’s why he says what he does. ‘I’m an alpha, I’m in rut, the only use I have for you is your cunt.’ He wants her to hurt, he wants her to leave, he wants Hux. _He wants Hux._ He does not need this reminder of the entirely too recent past.

He sees his words strike true, and he regrets them for their vulgarity at the same time as he doesn’t. She pales, flushes, looks totally outraged. ‘You’re a pig!’ she snaps and then vanishes, the barrier between them suddenly as strong as it ever was. 

Reflexively he reaches for her, even though he was the one who just drove her away, and feels his mind slam into the nothingness that sits heavy and impenetrable between them. He pulls back just as quickly, feeling burned. Tired. Disgusted with himself. 

He stands there for a long time, uncertain what he thinks, before finally dragging himself back to the shower to wash the stink of blood and sweat away once more.


	27. Chapter 27

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm almost over my cold. Yay! I hope you're all well... I also hope you trust me, at least a little bit, as a writer. No spoilers though. Um.
> 
> Thank you all so much for reading, for writing, for leaving comments and kudos. I eagerly await the comments I'll get on this one...

When Hux comms him and requests his presence in the redhead’s rooms a little earlier than usual he almost declines. He almost makes up some stupid excuse, claims sickness, anything to avoid seeing the omega. He feels torn. He doesn’t want to feel torn. The worst part is that on hearing his omega’s voice he almost resents Hux, but he can’t work out why, he has made his choice and he knows it’s the right one, and there’s no sense of hesitation there— but still—

He dithers getting ready, afraid to meet his own eyes in the mirror. Still he dresses in his best robes, his best armour, even if he dons them with a grimace, and makes sure his hair is brushed and his teeth are clean. 

Hux’s guards are Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio and FN-2037, both a little pink around the cheeks, and smelling heavily of sexual satisfaction— he sniffs again— and, in the Lieutenant’s case, a little of mated alpha. Huh. 

The door opens as he approaches, though Hux isn’t on the other side. The redhead must have remote activated it from deeper in his rooms. He steps inside. For a moment he’s contemplating making his excuses once he’s seen the omega, he really doesn’t feel fit company for anyone, but as the door closes Hux steps out of the berthroom in nothing more than a flimsy silk robe, a pale sea-foam green that looks delightful with his colouring. The omega stinks of lust, heavy and sweet, the scent of water-blossoms. 

His dick twitches, pulses, throbs like it’s actually his heart. He chokes on air, managing to splutter out the word ‘What?’

‘This is not me agreeing to be your mate; before we consider any such thing I still think we need to talk about our feelings when neither of us are in season,’ is the first thing Hux says, voice and face and scent and mind perfectly serious. ‘I am just tired of being in heat, I am tired of being turned on all the time, I am tired of trying to find some relief with just my own two hands. I want you to fuck me. I want you to knot me— but, as I said, this is not permission to _claim_ me. Do you accept my offer with all its limitations?’

He’s across the room, hands hovering around the redhead’s shoulders, afraid to touch, before he even manages to yelp the word ‘Yes!’ 

Hux snorts out a laugh, but it’s fond and affectionate and fearless, and before he can respond the redhead reaches up and pulls his head in for the kind of clumsy kiss inevitable with two people who have made it all the way to their thirties without ever even kissing anyone. His hands close down over those silk-covered shoulders, and he can feel Hux’s heat, feel the redhead’s wiry strength, and it’s compelling, lovely, he wants it. He wants to devour it. 

In a kind of awkward shuffle, still locked together, they make it to the berthroom— and there’s the nest— berth— _nest._ He pulls back, looks into Hux’s face, into those pale eyes gone dark, and he can feel how much the redhead wants him, wants him to fuck him, knot him, fill him up with sticky come— and there’s a flash there, a touch of desire, of fantasy, Hux imagining him licking it out again, the redhead’s long, pale fingers wrapped in his hair so he can’t pull back. It shudders through him.

‘You want me to fuck you?’ he asks, and it’s part because he can’t quite believe this is happening, and part because he wants the redhead to say the words again. 

‘I want you to _knot_ me,’ is what Hux whispers back, pink lips pressed against his ear, and then a sharp pain, a nipping bite to the edge of his jaw, and this is too fucking much. 

He’s scrabbling with the redhead’s robe, getting the tie undone and dragging the thing off, and then his hands are on that pale, silky skin, the soft flesh of hips and waist and upper thighs as he _drags_ the redhead to the berth, rubbing his face across throat and shoulders and kissing and biting and licking and suckling on every bit of flesh he can get within reach of his mouth. ‘I’m going to knot you,’ he promises, sounding fuck-drunk and stupid. ‘I’m going to knot you until you come and I’m going to keep knotting you until you can’t come anymore. I’m going to fuck you. I’m going to pump my cum in you until it’s oozing out of you for the next fucking week.’

‘Promises, promises,’ the redhead purrs, long fingers scrabbling with his armour, his robes. ‘How the fuck do I get you out of this?’

‘Let me,’ he says, catching those pale fingers and bringing them to his mouth for a kiss. ‘Get on the berth and get yourself ready—’ the thought suddenly catches him, bringing him momentarily out of his aroused delirium, ‘Where’s Millicent?’ he wouldn’t want to try and fuck her owner on top of her. He imagines they’d both get clawed for the audacity.

Hux blinks. ‘In the Medbay with Phasma and Mitaka—’ and then a smile creeps across his face, ‘— aren’t you a concerned alpha? I like it. Come on, I can’t wait all day, and if you don’t hurry up maybe I’ll go out there and find another alpha who can give me what I need.’

‘No you fucking won’t!’ he snarls, even though he can read the fact that the redhead isn’t serious in the omega’s mind. Hux doesn’t want any other alpha, Hux wants him. It’s thrilling. 

The redhead climbs onto the berth, every shift of that lithe form a tease, and then rolls onto his back, shifting up onto the mass of pillows at its head, and pulling his legs open and up, and then just blatantly shoves a couple of fingers up his own ass. That’s it. Fuck this getting undressed business. He can do it later. He scrabbles with the front of armour and robe enough to free his aching cock and then climbs onto the berth, slithering his way up between the redhead’s legs.

Hand shaking a little he reaches down between them to where Hux is wet and ready, his own fingers slipping over the redhead’s wet and slippery ones, probing at his hole. Fuck Hux is _dripping._ The omega catches his hand and pulls it away, pulls his wet fingers up to that lush, pink mouth, and actually licks some of the slick from them— ‘Forget about that, I’ve had my own fist up there earlier, I am beyond ready.’

It’s like a bomb going off. Everything is white and pressure and stupidity. Before he even realises what’s happening he’s fucking forward, the head of his dick just missing, sliding wet and slippery up the redhead’s ass crack. The omega reaches down, grabs him in the sure grip of those long fingers— and it’s a wonder he doesn’t knot up there and then— and guides him home. 

His hips skid forward, the first awkward thrust burying him halfway. Hux moans, deep and satisfied, and wraps those long arms around his shoulders. ‘Feels good,’ the omega murmurs, hips canting to try and force more of him inside.

He pulls out a little, hips quivering with tiny little aborted thrusts, gets a better angle and— one, two, there, there, that’s him all the way in, Hux just flexing around him, opening for him, letting him _in._ He can feel how good it is, how much the omega is enjoying himself, how his big, fat dick— and it feels huge and it feels _wonderful_ — is rubbing up against all those parts inside that have been _hungry_ for weeks. 

‘I love you,’ he bleats out, hips thrusting back and forth helplessly. He does. He does. And not just because Hux is letting him do this, is wanting him to do this, is loving the fact that he’s doing this. 

The redhead doesn’t seem to hear him, too busy head thrown back, hips canting up to receive him, long, pale thighs wrapping around his waist so he can’t escape. Why would he want to escape? He never wants to escape. 

They move together and it feels natural, animal, alpha and omega, and it doesn’t feel like he thought it would, feared it would, somewhere deep down inside, like he’s _taking_ something from Hux, instead it feels like he’s giving, servicing, fulfilling the redhead— and he can feel how close its coming, Hux’s orgasm, and he can feel all the heat and pleasure in the redhead’s pelvis, so he reaches down, gets a sweaty, slick damp hand on the omega’s little dripping cock and gives it a squeeze— and there. 

He feels the deep muscle pulls of the redhead’s pelvic floor spasming, feeling Hux go wild in his arms, arch up against him, moaning, mouthing desperately at his shoulder, feels that little omega cock spurt in his grip. It almost brings him along for the ride, but he’s not quite ready, knot not quite swelling, like his body wants time to savour this. ‘Keep going,’ the omega whines when he slows a little, worrying that he’s being too rough during the redhead’s throws. 

His hips snap forward at the words, thrusts resuming, braced over Hux’s long, pale form as the omega starts to come down from his first orgasm, collapsing back, stretching, luxuriating underneath him. It’s helplessly, stupefying, erotic. 

It’s stupid. It’s momentary. There is no reason for the thought to cross his mind, but it does, just for a second— he imagines Hux is Rey, pictures it even, her spread out under him, wonders if fucking her would feel so good, if she’s take his dick so well, if her body would seem so very perfectly made for him. He doubts it. Nothing, no one, could be as perfect as Hux, as lovely as Hus, as adored as—

The blow stuns him. The stink of distressed omega stuns him more. His dick is already wilting by the time Hux pushes him off, his own body uncooperative, almost paralyzed. The redhead scrabbles away from him, grabs for something underneath the pillows, and then there’s a blaster pressed against his forehead. ‘Fuck you!’ the omega snarls, and he thinks those might be tears on that lovely face, contorted as it is into a rictus of rage. _What’s happening?_ ‘On top of me, thinking of _her_. That fucking _scavenger bitch._ I see now, chasing me because she rejected you and you still wanted to get your dick wet. What a fucking fool I am, getting taken in by you playing pretend a better man—’

What. Oh. Oh fuck no. He didn’t. Did he? _DID HE?_ **Did he just project that image of Rey into Hux’s mind?** Oh fuck. He is such a fucking idiot.


	28. Chapter 28

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't want to leave you on that last cliffhanger too long, so I'm glad I got this finished today. As always thank you all so much for your kind reception of this fic, for your comments and kudos, and for being such lovely people!
> 
> Edited to fix broken HTML tag. Whoops.

‘No!’ he yelps, trying to reach for Hux. The redhead doesn’t shoot him, but does kick him roughly away, before scrambling off the bed and scooping the robe from the floor. ‘No, you’ve got it wrong.’ He pleads, shoving his dick roughly back into his pants with one hand and trying to grab Hux with the other.

‘ **Don’t touch me!** ’ the redhead roars, and he feels it echo through him like that time on the bridge, when with one command the omega made all the alphas stand down at once. His hand pulls back without his permission, slamming roughly against his own chest. ‘I will fucking shoot you if you touch me. Get out of my rooms!’ at least the latter isn’t in that same tone he seems helpless to disobey.

‘Please just listen!’ he begs as the redhead wraps that robe around his pretty form, hands rough, movements jerky, and then belts it brutally tight. ‘Please!’

Hux isn’t listening. Hux is stalking out of the berthroom, the image of rage, of offense, of an omega slighted. _And why shouldn’t he be?_ Oh, this time he has fucked everything up beyond repair. If he can’t get Hux to listen, to understand, there is no future for him. He might as well just kill himself here and now. No. NO. He has to— he can explain this. He can. 

He drags himself from the nest, the berth, and follows the redhead. Hux is moving quickly, blaster clenched tight in hand, heading straight for the bottle of Corellian brandy. Not bothering with a glass the omega uncorks it and takes a deep swig straight from the bottle, the blaster lurching up to point straight at him as he approaches. ‘If you get any closer I _will_ shoot you.’

He puts his hands up. ‘I won’t, I promise, just please let me explain—’

‘How could you possibly explain?!’ the omega snarls, looking at him with abject disgust. ‘You were fucking me while thinking of someone else. No. Not just thinking of someone else, you were thinking of my _enemy!_ There is no explanation for that.’

‘I wasn’t though,’ he pleads, body language hunching forward, beseeching, taking a tiny step in the omega’s direction until he sees that finger clench a little of the trigger, and feels that intent in that mind. ‘Please!’ he yelps. ‘Please let me explain!’

Hux flops back onto the couch and looks at him, and under the rage he can sense the redhead’s defeat. Hux really thought maybe he was different than other alphas, that maybe he wasn’t using, manipulating, the redhead to worm his way between those pale thighs, maybe he really had changed, and changed because he wanted to be with Hux— and Hux had let himself feel it, let himself grow fond, had even started entertaining stupid, romantic notions of accepting him as a mate— except he is just like every other worthless, knot-brained alpha and Hux is an idiot. 

‘No!’ he lurches forward, using the Force to flick the blaster out of the redhead’s hand moments before those fingers clench on the trigger. He can feel the redhead’s terror, the sudden sensation of being defenceless, but if he can just make Hux understand it will be worth it. He drops to the floor at the omega’s feet, not touching, longing to touch. ‘You are not an idiot. I am an idiot.’

‘Well you can say that again,’ the redhead mutters, kicking at him, though more out of a frustrated urge to strike him than with any real intent to do harm. He blocks the blow, and the next, and has to keep blocking until he can’t stop himself from catching the omega’s foot, cradling it in a gentle grip even as Hux tries to pull the limb back. His ankle is so small, so delicate. He wants to kiss it, lick it, bite it, mouth his way up between the redhead’s thighs and— now is not the time. At least Hux’s pheromones are keeping his dick in check. 

‘I wasn’t thinking of her!’ he insists, looking up and trying to meet that pale gaze. ‘I was thinking of you— except for a moment,’ he has to concede.

‘Hah!’ Hux snaps, triumphant, trying to pull his leg away again, and when that doesn’t work taking a deep sip of the brandy and looking away from him. Ignoring him. And not in any way that could be construed as a tease.

It hurts. It hurts but he has to continue on, he has to explain. ‘Snoke linked our minds, hers and mine, trying to manipulate me— it backfired on him in the end and I killed him, but our minds are still linked. She’s had a barrier up between us and I’ve reached for her in the past and been rejected—’ here he can feel a flinch run through Hux, a mirroring sense of rejection ‘— _but not since I fell in love with you_ ’ he insists. 

Hux doesn’t want to hear it, but he is hearing it anyway, and the words— the redhead doesn’t know how they make him feel. He can sense part of the redhead longs for them to be true, longs for the things he’s said not to be a lie— and feels furious with himself for those feelings. ‘Then why were you thinking of her when you were fucking me?’ the omega snaps.

‘She reached out to me today,’ he admits, and feels the words shudder through Hux. Feels the idea take root that he had been serious— but only as long as _she_ wasn’t an option. ‘No. It’s not like that,’ he insists, and then loses control of himself enough to press a kiss to the redhead’s calf. 

Hux flinches. Feelings conflicted. ‘You’d better kill me Ren,’ the redhead says eventually, voice calm, sipping more brandy. No. No. The idea is anathematic to him. ‘Because the next time I get my hands on a blaster nothing will stop me shooting you.’

‘Just listen, please,’ he whimpers, pressing his face to Hux’s knee. 

‘Fine,’ Hux says, nudging him roughly with the knee until he sits up and lets go. ‘Speak.’

‘She reached out to me today, wanting to know what we’ve been doing, why the First Order has been so quiet, whether it’s because I regret rejecting her offer to go back with her, to end this war in favour of the Resistance—’ he can feel outrage building up in Hux, a million interrogatory questions about what he might have told her, the weaknesses he might have revealed, whether he had said that he would betray them, whether the omega had let a _traitor to the cause_ fuck him. He keeps talking before the redhead has the chance to let any of it slip. ‘I told her nothing. I rejected her. I _do not want her._ ’

‘Then why—?’ the redhead begins.

‘Because you were so lovely, so perfect beneath me, and for a moment I was— I don’t know what I was doing. Comparing you favourably to her, fluffing my ego with how much I had made the right choice, how she could never compare to you.’

‘You expect me to believe that?’ Hux looks down at him and he can see the redhead isn’t convinced. What can he say? It’s the truth. If the truth won’t convince Hux what will?

For a moment he feels the deepest despair. He collapses against the redhead’s legs, wraps him arms around them, buries his face against the silk-clad flesh. This is the last time he will ever be able to touch the omega— and if he can’t touch Hux— what’s the point of it all? Maybe he should just die. Maybe he should just— the Darkness reaches for him, curls around him, whispers that what he should do is kill **_everything._** Himself, Hux, the crew of the fleet, Rey, his mother, the Resistance, all life in the Galaxy. End it. End it all. End his pain—

‘When I asked about the Force you offered to link our minds to show me,’ Hux says, dragging him from his downward spiral. ‘Do it now. Convince me you’re not lying.’

‘Yes. Yes,’ he mutters, sitting up, looking up into the redhead’s eyes. He wants to touch the omega’s face, but he doesn’t, just reaches out, gently, so very gently, more gently than he ever has before, and when his mind brushes Hux’s instead of keeping it a one-way connection he opens up the path, inviting the cool, curious form of Hux inside himself. 

He shows the redhead his memory of their sexual encounter, start to finish, every moment of desire and adoration for the omega laid bare before he gets to the agonizingly humiliating moment he’d let Rey slip into his thoughts. Hux probes at the memory, testing its edges, instinctively trying to determine if any of it has been fabricated—but it hasn’t. It hasn’t. And he can’t stop himself from barraging the redhead with other memories, every moment he can remember looking at or thinking of Hux and wanting him, desiring him, loving him above all others— and then the omega demands to see the memory of Rey, when she’d reached out to him, and he doesn’t want to but he has to oblige, he can’t fuck this up now, so, cringing, he lets the redhead explore it— careful, always careful, to make sure Hux sees that the omega had been in his thoughts, even as he’d been conflicted in them himself. 

After an excruciatingly thorough probing of his mind, Hux going over every thought, every impulse again and again, examining it all with the thorough attention to detail that marks his character— every humiliating, embarrassing, shameful moment laid bare, the progression of his feelings from contempt to desire to love exposed in a way that makes him feel like he’s on his back, his belly slit open, and his omega probing at his insides—the rage and the hurt ease, though they’re still there. Hux believes him. Hux thinks him monumentally stupid and insensitive and a lot of other things he doesn’t want the redhead thinking of him, but Hux believes him. ‘I love you,’ he reiterates, speaking the words out loud at the same time that he focusses on the emotion.

‘I believe you,’ Hux says, carefully withdrawing his mind, and it’s a wonder that the redhead can do that without guidance, but maybe it’s because Hux has such a strong sense of himself and who he is. He can sense something like love in reciprocation underneath all the hurt, but he won’t push for it right now. He can also sense that if Hux is ever face to face with Rey the omega is going to do everything in his power to make sure he’s the only one walking away from the confrontation. He can feel the lingering humiliation there, feels the guilt rise. ‘I do believe you, but maybe we should separate until things are over, not see each other again until neither of us are in season. Right now I don’t trust that your love isn’t just a product of hormones.’ It’s a horrible thing to hear, especially as Hux is convinced that the omega’s own feelings are genuine even if his are not. 

‘It’s not!’ he insists, wrapping his arms around Hux’s waist and clinging, not wanting to let go. ‘You’ve felt it for yourself, you must know it’s genuine.’

‘I know what you feel,’ the omega says, running long fingers through his hair, petting him as if he was Millicent. ‘I just don’t know if you’ll still feel that way once you’re no longer in rut— and don’t tell me you will, neither you nor I know what will happen— and we’re kidding ourselves if we think otherwise. Anyway, it won’t be long. A week, maybe a week and a half, and if you do still love me and if I do still—’ a pause, Hux swallows, makes himself continue on, ‘—still have feelings for you, then I’ll let you court me, officially. Do we have a deal?’

‘I want to say yes,’ he mumbles against the redhead’s thighs, rubbing his face against silky cloth and equally silky flesh, ‘I want to say yes so badly, but if I do you’ll make me stop touching you, won’t you?’

‘It’s for the best Ren,’ Hux says, still petting him.

‘Call me Kylo,’ he insists. ‘Or hell, call me Ben, I don’t care. I don’t want to stop touching you.’

‘You have to,’ Hux says, but he can feel the redhead is as reluctant as he is to break their clinch. Arousal is starting to build up, even though Hux doesn’t want to feel it, wants to still be too hurt and outraged to get turned on, but the omega is enjoying the way he’s touching him, on some level likes having him at his feet and begging to be allowed to continue to do so. 

‘Let me get you off, just one more time, then I’ll go. I’ll go and when I’m not in rut and still love you I’ll court you properly.’

He can feel how tempted Hux is, except— ‘I do believe you, but I don’t feel like letting you fuck me again just yet.’

‘I don’t need to fuck you, I could use my mouth. I want to suck your cock,’ and as he says it he realises it’s true. In this moment he’s not sure he’s ever wanted anything else as much— then the thought crosses his mind, other than _that_ of course. ‘Let me suck your cock and eat you out until you come and then I’ll go.’

‘Ren,’ Hux whines, and then ‘Ben,’ and that’s got him shuddering, helplessly aroused now the scent of distressed omega has faded and he can smell Hux’s arousal once more. ‘Ok, fuck, do it.’

Before the last word has even slipped the omega’s lips he has that robe unbelted and his mouth on that pretty pink cock. It’s small, like omega cocks are, but it’s so pretty, so perfectly shaped, such a lovely shade of pink, and even though it tastes like cock and like Hux’s cum it also tastes delightful in his mouth. He mouths over the head, laps at the slit, then opens up and sucks it down. It fits as though his mouth was made for this— he can take the whole thing and the head only reaches far back enough to tickle at his gag reflex if he’s not careful. He pulls back, bobs back down, gets a rhythm going. 

Hux’s hands tangle into his hair, the omega fighting himself not to push his head down, not to keep him where Hux wants him. He reaches up, helps secure the grip of those long fingers, and then, because his mouth is otherwise occupies, projects into Hux’s mind _‘Do it. Take what you want from me._

He feels the omega shudder, and then that grip firms and those hips start thrusting, and Hux is keeping his head down, not letting him pull back, and he can breathe through his nose because the redhead’s dick isn’t too long, but every now and then the head brushes the sensitive parts of his throat and an ugly, choking sound slips out, and it’s all wonderful. Perfect. Helplessly arousing. 

He gets a hand down his pants, just holding his aching knot, not even really squeezing it, the other arm wrapped around Hux’s waist to anchor himself. A few more thrusts and the grip in his hair becomes punishing as the omega drags him off, a pathetic whine escaping his throat, his tongue darting out, trying to get a final taste, but Hux isn’t pulling his away so much as shoving his head further down as the redhead tilts his hips up, and then his face is being pushed up against the omega’s ass and his tongue is tasting the redhead’s slick and that’s it, he latches on again, lapping at Hux’s hole, still wet and red and soft and slippery from when he’d _fucked_ the omega just before. 

He fucks his tongue in, sucks on the rim, and Hux humps his hips up once, twice, gets a hand down on that pretty omega cock just as he’s squeezing his own knot, and— his mind whites out, a helpless groan smothered in the wet flesh of his beloved’s ass. 

He comes back to himself to find himself slumped between Hux’s legs, face buried against the omega’s belly. He feels sticky. He feels wonderful. Hux feels relaxed, pleased, amused and slightly embarrassed. He reads the thought that apparently he’s got cum in his hair, Hux’s cum, and the redhead doesn’t quite know what to do with that thought. He wonders if Hux has realised that he came all over the redhead’s calves, the base of the couch, part of the floor, his own robes and armour. He really is a shameful, sticky mess— he just doesn’t care right now. 

‘You are lovely and I adore you,’ he mumbles against Hux’s sticky skin. 

‘And you are a mess,’ Hux replies, but he can feel affection and pleasure radiating form the redhead’s mind. 

‘I’ll get up in a minute, I’ll go in a minute,’ he promises. 

‘You’ll get cleaned up first,’ the redhead warns, tugging gently on his hair. He groans, thrilling at the sharp feeling, rubbing his face back and forth against Hux’s skin. ‘I’m not having you walk through the ship looking like that.’

‘Why not?’ he mumbles, but he’s not really going to argue. He doesn’t care if everyone sees him triumphant, stinking of his omega’s cum, but at the same time he also doesn’t want those who still want to fuck Hux to get a whiff to take back to their berths and imagine while squeezing their knots. Hux is _his._ Anyway, Hux might get embarrassed if he left looking and smelling like he does.

‘You know why not,’ Hux says with a final, delightful tug of his hair. ‘You can use my shower before you go.’

‘In a minute,’ he promises. ‘In a minute.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A quick note about reality versus fiction: If you're with someone, or if someone wants to be with you, and they take rejection or perceived rejection as a reason to threaten to kill themselves/all life in the Universe it's probably not a healthy relationship. Even if they're troubled and have mental health issues, and even if you love them dearly, you must take care of yourself. Stay safe, please.


	29. Chapter 29

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're actually getting close to the end now, only a few more chapters to go and the fic will be over. It's a weird feeling, contemplating it. Thanks, as always, for how lovely you've been. I really do appreciate all the comments and kudos and all of it!

It’s not like he was going to hide what had happened, and anyway, it would have been impossible. From the moment he stepped into the hall, smelling of Hux’s toiletries and stuffed into a spare set of the omega’s training uniform that was obviously far too small for him, even if not too short, word was going to get around. Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio had looked absolutely scandalised, only the scent of thoroughly pleasured omega wafting out of his General’s quarters stopping the Lieutenant from his first, instinctive reaction to challenge him even though he had sworn not to. Thankfully he’d soon regained his wits, though he’d then descended into massive internal argument about Hux’s right to summon alphas to service him without officially mating with them first— something his upbringing finds thoroughly outrageous, but that he as an individual wants to accept and think of as a great and gloriously progressive idea, even though his own instincts are clutching their pearls about it— and if some part of him doesn’t accept it, what does that make him? No better than everything he’s ever fought against. Does he have a place in Hux’s Utopia? etc. etc. It’s in the Lieutenant’s favour that he has someone like FN-2037 to look at him with fond exasperation and poke at him until he manages to drag his attention away from his less than productive thoughts. 

He doesn’t think it was the two of them that spread the news around the ship, and from the ship to the other ships of the fleet, both Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio and FN-2037 being rather discrete individuals. Perhaps it was simply his walk of no-shame through the halls, wearing Hux’s clothes and still smelling faintly of the redhead, or maybe it because of the cleaning droids —who had shortly thereafter had enough of dealing with everyone in season squirting fluids everywhere and leaving them to deal with it and threatened to strike unless they were given shorter shifts, more breaks to engage in whatever recreational activities cleaning droids might get up to, and the promise of procuring more of their number to service each ship before this ever happens again. They’d supported their argument with examples of the disgusting messes they’d been left to deal with during this time, and even his conceding to their terms very quickly once he’d realised exactly how much of the fleet would be encrusted with dried alpha cum if it hadn’t been for their tireless service had not stopped word getting out about the state he’d left his robes and armour in. 

He’s too happy to be angry. Far too happy. Even if he has done as Hux has asked and kept away from the redhead— it’s only for now, only until everyone is out of season, and then he can court Hux properly, make the omega his mate, make him _his_ officially and forever— because he’ll never lose interest and he’ll make sure Hux never loses interest and he’ll never let the bond between them weaken to the point some other alpha can challenge him and steal Hux away. 

Somehow he has managed to keep himself occupied for these days, thought mainly in training and bonding with the crew. Eating every meal in the Mess Hall— often with Captain Ansolc and whoever of his omega’s guards aren’t currently occupied. Hux was right when he suggested that eating with the crew would help them bond, and beyond that he has had the chance to observe the ones he is getting to know interact with each other— as well as getting to see some of the amusing stupidity of a mating season without his usual contempt and getting preoccupied by his feelings for Hux.

There was, for example, a moment the night before when Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio and Lieutenant Cadroris— FN-2037’s ex, had almost actually challenged each other in the middle of the Mess Hall— undeniably over FN-2037, and he’s happy, both happy and proud of his pack, that they seem to have taken his acceptance of the alpha/beta pairing as strong advice to accept it also. He’s not sure how the incident started, at the time he was listening to Captain Ansolc wax poetic about Mitaka in the hopes that she’d mention Hux, but the growling had soon attracted his attention. They’d both puffed up and started circling each other, and he’d been debating getting up and stopping them— because, as far as he can see, Lieutenant Cadroris has voided any right to compete for FN-2037 the moment he walked away and left his mate to the tender mercies of an unmerciful pack— When FN-2037 had approached, said something he didn’t quite catch, but was obviously _cutting_ to his ex, and had led the suddenly besotted looking Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio away. Lieutenant Cadroris had stood there looking heartbroken for a moment, before rut and rage had gotten the better of him and he’s lurched to try and attack the other Lieutenant, but before he could get to his own feet and interject himself into the situation Ensign Uskais had been there, and she’d taken the alpha down in seconds and then stood over him lecturing him— even though she is his inferior in rank— until the man had gotten the message. The pack, or at least the Inner Court of the pack, are not impressed with him. If he wants that to change he might actually have to change himself— and for a second it was like looking in a mirror, but in the end he doesn’t know if the other alpha will make the choice he has, the choice to be a better man. 

When Hux comms him he’s in his training rooms with FN-1923, FN-1905 and FN-0954, the latter having finally gotten FN-1923 pinned, the two omegas’ sparring practice having degenerated into an all-out brawl about five minutes in. He thrills to hear his redhead’s voice, and thrills more when he hears the words ‘The pheromone scrubbers have arrived.’

For a moment he is all triumph. None of the mated pairs have emerged yet, and if they can get the scrubbers installed before they do maybe— just maybe— they’ll all be out of season in a matter of days and he can move forward with the next step. By the end of the week Hux might officially be his. 

Of course it doesn’t work out that way. The first pair emerges before lunch time, and by the end of the day, by the time the techs have gotten all the scrubbers installed and are preparing to run preliminary tests, a dozen pairs and a handful of groups are wandering the halls bringing with them the pleasant scent of mated alphas and omegas. 

His temper starts to fray, every noise, every scent, every sound starts to wear on him, and his dick swells and his knot aches, even though it’s not inflated, and he wants to kill everyone who even looks at him, and every mated alpha he smells just pisses him off even more, and— he comms Hux. ‘You were right. Rut’s gotten worse. I’ll lock myself in my rooms.’

‘Me too,’ the redhead pants, and he can almost smell the redhead’s slick, sweet, smeared over his face, dripping across his tongue. ‘It won’t be long now,’ the omega sighs. ‘Not long now and I can get your knot in me— oh fuck. Sorry. Sorry Ben. I should go now. I’ll see you soon—’

He groans, grabbing at his dick. For a moment he almost breaks, almost chases Hux down, almost— but he promised and if he wants to _prove_ to Hux everything he’s said then he’ll just have to wait. He hates waiting. ‘I love you,’ he mutters, and, ‘and I know it’s late but I’d like to nominate Captain Ansolc for command while we’re out,’ and then, after Hux has agreed, ‘I love you, I do, I adore you,’ and then he breaks the connection, staggering off to seal himself inside him rooms. 

Hux was right, he doesn’t become mindless, though maybe it would be easier of he did. He paces a lot, dick throbbing, and everything feels off, not quite real, and incredibly irritating, and he wants to fight and he wants to fuck and he really wants to fight off a bunch of alphas to get the chance to fuck Hux and it’s horrible. 

Eventually he jerks off, and he doesn’t even need the porn, just the memory of Hux and the way the redhead had felt beneath him and tasted on his tongue— he lies in his berth and shoves his fingers in his mouth, imagines they’re Hux’s pretty little cock, and squeezes his knot until he comes, again and again, avoiding his nest. Every instinct screams that it’s a courting nest and he mustn’t contaminate it, mustn’t do anything to put the redhead off, because he will get the redhead in here, he will get the redhead in his nest, he will knot Hux in his nest— and every orgasm bleeds into the next one. 

It’s easy to lose track of time. He eats when the droids delivery his food, always red meat, always barely cooked, dripping red, and sometimes he fucks his fist until he’s so tired he sleeps, and sometimes he paces and scents the air, but the air quickly goes dead and dull, and he can’t even smell Hux in the redhead’s rooms, fist undoubtedly buried in his ass, and he hates it. He HATES IT. And. And. And he bathes sometimes so he can fuss with his nest without contaminating it, clean it, perfect it, get the angle of the walls just right— until the thought of having Hux in there with him is too much so he has to slope off back to his berth or fling himself onto his couch or stand under the spray of his shower and squeeze his knot until he comes and comes and comes— it’s like a sickness. It makes him lonely. He _craves_ Hux, whole body, like an addict, but he _promised._

He’s not sure how long it is until he falls into something like delirium, mind flickering with memories and dreams, surfacing every now and then to take stock and remind himself that he’s still here, still alive, still himself. Sometimes he imagines he went back with Rey, chose her side, turned on Hux and all of his pack, and that he’s standing over the redhead’s body, bruised and broken, and that he feels nothing— except some deep, existential horror gnaws at him, even in the depths of those dark dreams, and he knows he’s done wrong, and he feels guilt he cannot name, even as she holds his hand and leads him along past the bodies of all the dead. Mitaka. Phasma. Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio. FN-2037. Captain Ansolc. FN-0954. FN-1923. FN-1905. And she’s laughing all the time, trapped in joy, as if this is something to celebrate— the death of his pack. When he wakes from those dreams he sometimes weeps, brain foggy, glad that it is not reality.

Then there are the dreams when he watches Hux accept someone else, one of the ones who asked him for permission to court the redhead, another alpha— one of the lurkers, sometimes even Captain Ansolc. He sees the omega toss and turn in ecstasy beneath them, their knots buried up inside, and always, always the redhead’s eyes open and see him and those lips open and Hux tells him how inferior he is, how Hux could never want him, how he can’t even make the omega come— but he can. He has. When he wakes in terror and almost lurches from his rooms to make sure they are only dreams he reminds himself that he has. He has made Hux come, twice, and he will do so again. He will make Hux come until the redhead will never be able to even notice another alpha. 

The better dreams are the ones in which Hux is his mate, _his,_ in which he hadn’t fucked everything up to start with and had been better, a better man, and they two of them had come together naturally— and sometime the dreams are simple, domestic, like his life before and during the temple, and sometimes his dreams are of the two of them taking down Snoke, pulling the old bastard’s body from his throne so he can place Hux there instead, get to his knees, slither in between those thighs and occupy his mouth. And some of them are of the future, the two of them, alpha and omega, the Dominant Pair, standing on the bridge of the _Finalizer_ and looking out over the stars, every one of them brought to heel, victorious over the entire Galaxy, and everything at peace, everything brought to order—

He weeps when he wakes from those dream too, but they’re tears of frustration. He wants it. He wants it so badly— and he has to wait, and he hates waiting. It’s after one of those dreams, miserable, lonely, _aching_ for his omega that he reaches out. 

Not to Rey. To Luke. 

The fear is gone. The fear— he was afraid Luke would reject him. That was why he didn’t want to risk encountering his uncle again. Underneath it all he still wants the old omega to love him. He wants, as he’s always wanted, to be Luke’s child— not the child of Luke and one of his parents, but the child of all three of them, their weaknesses shored up by each other’s strengths, and his uncle at the heart of them all. 

He lets himself slip into a meditative trance for the first time since Crait, since Snoke’s death, and as he falls he reaches out, wants his uncle—

But it’s not Luke that suddenly stands before him, around the two of them an endless expanse of white. ‘Dad,’ he acknowledges Han. The man looking at once tired and old, as he had on Starkiller, in the moments before he had ignited the lightsabre, but at the same time like a young man in his prime, tall and strong, an alpha in all his potential.

‘Ben,’ the man nods back.


	30. Chapter 30

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had another productive weekend, so here we are. Happy Easter, by the way, to people who celebrate it. Thank you all so much for reading, and for the comments and kudos, and being so nice!- I hope you're all not too disappointed by this chapter. Um.

‘Is this where you’ve been keeping yourself?’ he asks, looking around the expanse of nothingness. ‘I would have thought you’d be with Luke.’

A grimace crosses that creaseless-craggy face. ‘It’s not so bad,’ Han says, waving absently at the world around them. ‘It’s— _peaceful_ ’ the latter is said in a tone that makes it clear exactly how much Han is not enjoying his peaceful, boring afterlife.

‘You were a coward, you know that?’ he finds himself saying. ‘You spent all those years playing head games with my mother, with Luke, and above all _yourself._ If you were a real alpha you would have gone for it, courted them both, had them both.’

‘Like you’re a real alpha,’ Han snaps. ‘The moment you popped a knot you were crying about it and demanding we put you on rut-suppressants. You have no idea how much you worried your mother, Luke. _Me._ ’

He cringes from the memory, from all the parts of the memory this man in front of him doesn’t know. Even though he forgave his father so recently he suddenly finds he wants to hurt the man, touch the man, reach out and have some impact on the impassive figure from his childhood, the one he was never good enough for. ‘You want to know why I was crying about it?’ he snarls. ‘Because I popped it imagining I was shoving it up Luke,’ his father flinches back, nostrils flaring. ‘Imagine if it hadn’t upset me like that, imagine if I was the kind of alpha who didn’t have scruples stopping me from chasing after a lonely, still _fertile,_ abandoned omega, just because he was my uncle.’

‘Luke never would have laid a hand on you,’ Han asserts, though he can see the idea of being challenged for a prospective mate is riling his father, making the man puff up.

‘No, because he was a _good_ man. But I’m not. I never was,’ he laughs, because it’s true. He really never was going to be a son this man could be proud of. ‘How long do you think he could have held out if I’d decided to pursue him? He loved me, and I loved him, and he was so lonely, so sad, you have no idea how much you hurt him. You broke his heart, dad.’

‘What about your mother?!’ Han shouts, leaning in, body language threatening. ‘How do you think she would have felt if I’d left her for her brother?’

He laughs. ‘You didn’t want to do that. You wanted them both. Don’t lie to me.’

‘As if they would have let me!’ Han bellows, throwing his hands up in the air. ‘They kissed you know, just the once, before they knew what they were to each other— and it messed them up. Can you imagine me going up to them and asking them to do that again, just without any clothes on, and with one or more parts of my anatomy shoved up inside them each?’

‘Don’t be revolting,’ he snaps. 

‘Why not? You started it kid.’

‘No!’ he snarls, leaning in, body language just as threatening as Han’s. ‘You started it. Giving me that disgusting porn. What the fuck were you thinking?’

A frown, as if Han can’t remember for a moment, and then, ‘I was thinking that my son, my _alpha_ son was acting all messed up, like he didn’t even want to be an alpha, and I was thinking that he was trapped in the temple with a bunch of omegas— and don’t bring up your uncle— and maybe he’d stop acting like such a fucking _beta_ if he had the chance to get himself off. Get acquainted with his knot on his own, before one of those omegas seduced you and you freaked out when you couldn’t get your dick to work properly.’

‘How the fuck was I supposed to get off to that shit?!’ he shouts. ‘It’s revolting. Demeaning. Did you seriously used to sit around tugging on your knot imagining treating my mother, Luke, like that?’

‘Of course not,’ Han flaps a hand at him, dismissive. He doesn’t quite believe it. ‘It’s just fantasy. It’s porn, It’s not _real._ ’

‘There are real people in it!’ by now they’re standing close, both puffed up, two alphas moments away from a challenge, and he gets right in his father’s face and glories in the fact that he’s bigger, taller, stronger than Han, even when the other alpha was young. ‘Those are real alphas and omegas and betas having real experiences, and from what I’ve read a lot of those experiences weren’t good ones.’

‘Who cares?’ Han shakes his head. ‘Why are you arguing with me about the ethics of pornography?’

‘Because it bothers me!’ he bellows. ‘It bothers me now and it bothered me back then and it fucked me up! It fucked me up, dad! It made we not want to be an alpha.’

‘Well that wasn’t my intention! I just wanted to help!’ Han pulls back, takes a deep breath, wipes a hand roughly over his face. ‘I’m sorry if it did. I didn’t mean for it to— and look at you now. You’re obviously no longer having problems in that department.’

It makes him puff up, in pride this time, even though he kicks himself for letting Han’s words have any effect on him. He doesn’t want to want his father’s approval. 

‘Look kid, being an alpha is hard. And yeah, I guess I messed things up with you, and I guess I messed everything up with your mom and Luke, but I didn’t do any of it deliberately. I Loved you all. I still love you all, I still love _you,_ even after everything you’ve done.’

He laughs, and it’s bitter, and all the truths he hasn’t wanted to think about, hasn’t let himself think about, are suddenly upon him. ‘You won’t for long,’ he says. ‘Just like Luke, you have to have a limit, and I’m going to have go past it and beyond.’

‘What do you mean?’ his father asks, and suddenly the youth is faded from Han and the man is nothing but an old, tired alpha. Worried. So worried. 

He rubs a hand over his face, larger than his father’s, stronger, made to cradle Hux’s waist. ‘You’ll get a chance to work things out with mom and Luke soon, so don’t waste it. Make sure they both know you love them.’

‘What are you talking about?!’ Han demands, and he can see fear in those dark eyes. 

‘I’m going to have to kill her,’ and it’s horribly freeing to say the words. ‘I’m going to have to kill both of them.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I didn’t want to, you have to know that. I never wanted to, I hesitated last time, but I’ve got no choice now. Her and Rey. They’re both going to have to die.’

‘Her? Your _mother?_ ’ Han yelps. ‘And Rey. Why?’

He fixes his father with his gaze, his own eyes so much darker than Han’s. His own soul. ‘Because they’re in my way. Because they’re a danger to my pack. Because Hux will never permit Rey to live, not after—’

‘Not after what?!’ Han demands. ‘Why the fuck do you care what that weedy, ginger _bitch_ thinks?!’

‘Because he’s _mine,_ ’ he snarls, stepping in close to the old man, body language reduced to nothing more than threat. ‘He’s my _mate_ — and we’re going to rule everything, fix everything, give the Galaxy a better future than you ever could.’

‘You’re delusional,’ Han murmurs, stepping away from him, looking at him like he’s a monster. It’s freeing. It is so freeing. ‘You’re not my son, not anymore. I don’t know you.’

He nods. It hurts, but not as much as imagining a future without Hux, and that’s what he’d have to give up, Hux and his self, his true self, just to please these people who ultimately let him down. ‘I know. It’s ok. I forgive you for all of it, but I have to move on, I have to keep walking forward. When you see Luke tell him I forgive him too. Tell him it was Snoke. The old bastard got in his mind, controlled him, it was never him. He never betrayed me.’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘Goodbye dad.’

He opens his eyes. He feels calm. A deep breath— ah. His rut is over.


	31. Chapter 31

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So here we are at the end. This was originally going to be the last two chapters, but I'm posting them together. I'm not sure they're as finished as I'd like- some of you who read my last series may remember that one of our dogs died while I was writing it- well my dog is very sick, has been sick for some time now, but things are not looking good right now- so I'm trying to get things ready, fic wise, in case I end up out of commission. I may not respond to comments as diligently as I usually would, but I do want to say thank you to all of you for how wonderful you've been, and for all the comments and the kudos! I have really, really appreciated it.

He waits a couple more days, just to be sure, examining his feelings for Hux, making sure they haven’t weakened, faded, disappeared. They’re just as strong as ever. It’s a relief. 

It may be the hardest wait of his life, but it feels worth it, and when he finally steps outside his room he feels like a King, stepping out into his Kingdom. Everywhere he looks there are alphas, betas, omegas, and all of them look back, and he glories in the respect they feel for him, the way they feel that he is their rightful Dominant Alpha— even those that had retreated to their nests with mates early on feel the same, having stepped out of their private little worlds and out into a pack that finally had accepted him and was functioning a lot healthier than it has in a long time. 

He heads to the bridge, head high, moving easily through his pack. His nose flares, trying to bring in scent, but he cannot— and it’s odd, numbing, and he tries to ignore it, but it niggles at the back of his mind. After all this time being able to read scents as well as minds, he’s not sure he actually likes these pheromone scrubbers. 

Hux looks up and over the moment he steps out onto the bridge, and the redhead is so beautiful it almost stops him in his tracks. No. No, he can say with certainty that his feelings haven’t subsided any. He notes with satisfaction that Mitaka is standing beside Hux , the two of them obviously just discussing something. Part of him notes that the dark-haired omega looks a lot better, still tired, still a bit strained, and pain and hurt still linger in his presence in the Force, but still, he looks better, and the pack members around the omegas are obviously supportive and protective, and the scene fills him with satisfaction. Nonetheless he can’t really take his eyes off Hux. 

As he approaches Mitaka says something, softly, and withdraws so he can come to rest at his place by the redhead’s side, under the watchful gaze of Lieutenant Uskais and FN-1923. ‘So,’ Hux begins, glancing over to him, not quite coy— more a little nervous. Yes, Nervous. Hux is worried that his feeling have dimmed, that the redhead’s fears have come to pass. ‘You’re done with rut?’

‘I’m done with rut,’ he agrees, nose flaring, trying to pull Hux’s water-blossom scent into his nose. He smells nothing, just the sterile dullness of properly scrubbed air. ‘You’re done with heat?’

‘I am,’ Hux agrees. ‘I am done, everyone has come out of their nests, and we had no problems while the two of us were otherwise distracted. We can leave our shelter and return to pursuing the Resistance.’

‘Soon,’ he promises. ‘There’s just one thing I want to do first—’ his heart is pounding in his chest, his hands feel sweaty, he’s sure he would stink if it wasn’t for the air scrubbers. Carefully, slowly, he reaches out, takes Hux’s hand in his, entangling his thicker, stronger, fingers between Hux’s pale, slender ones. ‘I still love you,’ he says it quietly, so only the guards can hear. ‘My feelings haven’t changed. Please, before we turn our attention to _crushing_ our enemies, let me court you.’

Those pale eyes examine him for a moment, a small smile creeping over that lovely mouth. He can feel Hux’s satisfaction, _relief_. ‘Of course, go right ahead,’ the redhead says.

It’s funny, he knew (hoped) this would be Hux’s response, he’s got his nest ready, he’s got a litany of things he wants to do to that delightful body— and yet for a moment his mind is completely blank. He doesn’t know what to do next— and then he sees Captain Ansolc in the background, taking the report of a commstech, her black eyes glancing at him, happy for him— ‘I’ll gather some alphas to my training rooms if you’ll consent to coming to watch.’

Hux snorts out a laugh. ‘I’ve seen you fight, I know how strong you are, you don’t need to impress me. I am already impressed.’

He brings that perfect hand to his lips, presses a suckling kiss to its back. ‘Let me do this properly.’

‘If that’s what you want,’ the omega says, and then leans in close, and whispers, ‘Though you could just take me back to your rooms and stick your knot in me.’

His dick throbs, and he shoves his other hand down there to give it a quelling squeeze. Tempting. So tempting, but— ‘I really do want to do this properly. I want to court you formally, you’re too important for me to rush this.’

‘Then I’ll indulge you,’ Hux says, though the words don’t quite match the delight he feels in his omega’s mind. 

Fuck, he is so fucking lucky. By all rights Hux shouldn’t let him anywhere near him after all the things he has done. ‘I really do adore you,’ he says, pressing one last kiss to the back of Hux’s hand, before releasing it and striding over to Captain Ansolc. If he’s going to fight anyone to impress his redhead she’s going to be one of them. 

In the end he faces off against her, Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio, FN-1905, and that dark-skinned older male alpha who he learns is actually a close friends of hers— Sergeant Noiht Vitstastis. Hux arrives with his guards as well as Mitaka and Phasma, his two closest friends, his Secondary Omegas here to judge his potential mate and possibly advise the redhead against his choice— though in this case he doesn’t feel that worried they will. They even bring Millicent, curled up in Hux’s arms.

Amongst the rest of the audience are FN-1923, FN-2037 and FN-0954, any fight they see a good training opportunity— though he knows FN-2037’s eyes and libido are likely to be at least partially preoccupied by Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio. The two of them stay close by, talking, body language intimate, as everyone gets ready for the brawl, the alphas stretching, Hux and his omegas finding the best part of the room to stand. A scan of the Lieutenant and the Stormtrooper’s mind is enough to tell him that they are officially mates now, a thing made public while he was out, and the shame in both of them is fading much to his relief. He also sees that as a pair they are still looking for another alpha— which is a thing he might have to keep an eye on himself, he can’t have any worthless knot-head creeping their way into the nest of such an important pair.

Then it’s on, four against one, all the other alphas working together to try and bring him down, because that’s what he wants, he wants to show Hux his strength, and they are happy to oblige their Dominant Alpha. Captain Ansolc comes at him first, as is her nature, the Lieutenant lingering back until he gets a stock of the situation, and the Sergeant and FN-1905 close, but just out of his reach. He blocks her first blow, her second, but as he blocks her third the Sergeant comes in underneath her fist and lands a strike to his gut. He grabs the man’s arm, pushing the Captain away as he drags the Sergeant in close, aiming a punch at the man’s face. 

The man drops his weight, not quite escaping the grip, but making the punch land off-target, and then the man goes for his legs, kicking out to try and destabilise him. He dodges and Sergeant Vistsastis goes down, balance lost. As he raises one of his feet to stomp down on the man’s belly Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio and FN-1905 dart in, the Lieutenant drags the Sergeant away as the Stormtrooper strikes out, getting in a couple of solid hits until he kicks her away from himself, Captain Ansolc rushing in to tackle him before he’s regained his balance. Moments later the Lieutenant joins her and then he loses track of what’s happening. He lets himself fall into the violence, the serenity that comes with it, getting lost in the struggle. 

This time he takes down Captain Ansolc first, a moment of overconfidence on her part and a feigned weakness on his and he gets her pinned, hand on the back of her neck. ‘I yield!’ she declares, joyful, happy for him, her own body buzzing with the pleasure of the fight. He lets her up in time to face the Sergeant’s next attack, coming in low, trying to throw him down again. Moments later the Lieutenant joins the Captain, and he has enough mind to note they work well together, before FN-1905 joins them and he’s entirely subsumed in fighting them off. 

Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio is the next to fall, taking a blow meant for the Captain so the man can escape to come around behind him. He can feel the strike land true, feel the Lieutenant almost lose consciousness at the strength of the punch. ‘Yield!’ he demands, knowing that the Lieutenant is inclined to keep fighting long after he should give up. The man needs a Medidroid for that blow. The Lieutenant wavers, before consciousness flickers for a split second and he drops to one knee. ‘I yield.’ 

He keeps enough attention on the other alpha to ensure he’s off the field and in FN-2037’s capable hands, being dragged over to the resentfully watching Medidroids for treatment. The Sergeant manages to land a heavy blow to his ribs because of his distraction, so he forces his head back in the game. They circle each other, wary, and he can’t help his admiration for this other alpha’s strength, his capacity as a fighter, his obvious experience. A feint left from the Sergeant, a couple of blows landed to his ribs— the same spot as last time, bruising, painful, he gets a grip on the other man’s neck, but the man shakes him loose, they circle again— he could use the Force to end this in seconds, but he wants to do this with only his body. He wants to prove his physical strength to Hux, to say that even if something happens that cuts him off from the Force he can still fight. He can still protect their pack— FN-1905 tackles him while he’s distracted, the Sergeant joining her seconds later, and they brawl, all three of them scrabbling on the ground, until he manages to get a knee to the back of the Stormtrooper’s neck and she yields. 

Then it’s just him and the Sergeant. It’s a hard squabble, the man a well seasoned fighter and _tough,_ not afraid to get hurt. He feels the other’s ribs break beneath his fists, almost gets a savage elbow in the eye he almost lost to Rey, manages to get up before being knocked down again, the fight ending with them once more on the ground before he manages to get a good grip on the man, get the man flipped face down, get him pinned. A breath. Two. ‘I yield,’ the Sergeant says. 

He stands, victorious, before bending down and giving the Sergeant a hands up. They share a nod of respect and then head off the field, both limping a little, sore, bruised— he almost doesn’t notice, but— the moment he steps off the field Captain Ansolc is all but flinging a Medidroid at him. ‘Get him patched up,’ she orders as the thing starts treating him, muttering to itself the entire time. He pretends he can’t understand it. ‘The Supreme Leader will need his body to be in good working order,’ the latter is said with an actual wink. She flicks her gaze to Hux, watching with a small smile on his face. ‘Congratulations, hey?’

‘Thanks,’ he nods. ‘You fought well.’

‘I was an over-confident idiot, but lesson learned,’ she sighs, then glances over at Mitaka. ‘Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go respectfully admire certain people from a distance.’

‘You could try talking to him?’ he suggests as she turns to walk away.

‘Maybe if I ever grow a pair,’ she laughs, turning back to him, ‘I’m too afraid I’ll frighten him.’

‘I think you should give him more credit,’ he says, shaking his head. ‘How did you cope while I was out? I asked Hux to add you to the temporary command staff.’

‘I was perfectly, unfailingly polite from a respectful distance,’ she replies, rueful, then a smile, a true and honest smile, breaks over her face. ‘Did you know that now that you are no longer in rut and I am no longer part of the command staff I have been given command of the _Absolute?_ Whether that was your doing or not let me still thank you, if you hadn’t promoted me to the command staff the ship might have gone to someone else.’

The _Absolute?_ Ah. Yes. The ship commanded by that Captain whose head he pulled off for wanting to court Hux. ‘Congratulations,’ he says and means it. 

Her gaze keeps drifting to Mitaka so he dismisses her moments before the Medidroid beeps, rudely, signalling that it’s done treating him and is considering refusing to treat him next time if he keeps getting injured for stupid reasons. He thanks it, because that’s what Luke would have done, and turns to glance once more at Hux, readying himself to go over— except Lieutenant Kanron-Viellio is standing in the way, leaning a little on FN-2037. ‘If you treat him badly you’ll have me to answer to,’ the alpha says.

‘I won’t,’ he promises, thinking to himself that if he treats Hux bad it’s _Hux_ and his blaster that he really will have to answer to. ‘I promise. I intend to _treasure him._ ’

The Lieutenant looks at him for a long moment, assessing his honesty, before nodding. ‘Good man. Congratulations.’

‘Thank you,’ he says, and he can’t stand it anymore. ‘Sorry, but I think I’m going to see what my omega thought of my performance.’

‘Good luck,’ and that’s FN-2037, as if he needs luck. The look on Hux’s face tells him he’s already the luckiest alpha alive. Fuck, he’s getting soppy. 

He walks over to his omega, head high, moving in the way that best displays his physicality. ‘Very impressive Ben,’ Hux says, and even though the tone is even and the words could almost be read as sarcastic, he can feel that Hux means them. The redhead leans in close. ‘I am impressed.’

He shudders, dick hardening. 

‘Here,’ his omega says, handing Millicent over to Phasma. ‘Watch her for me tonight?’

‘Of course,’ the Captain says, cradling the cat close. She looks back at him, Millicent, gold eyes knowing in a way that almost makes him uncomfortable. She seems ok with what’s happening though, which is all that he can ask for from her. 

‘Now, are you going to show me your nest?’ Hux actually purrs, and his attention snaps straight back to his redhead. 

‘Yes!’ he yelps, then clears his throat. ‘Yes, if you want to see it?’

‘Oh, I do,’ the redhead replies, stepping in close and taking his arm. ‘Lead on.’

_Lead on._ Oh fuck, what is he doing? Does he know how to do this? Can he do this? What will Hux think of the nest? What if he _hates_ it? No. No. He needs to get himself together. A glance at the redhead, waiting for him. _He can do this._

He leads his omega back towards his rooms, walking the halls with Hux still holding his arm, that slight, warm body pressed against him. It’s odd. Thrilling. Titillating. Exciting. Out of character— but he can read from Hux a sense of mild embarrassment and the determination to do this, to not let go to stride down the halls independently as he usually would, because doing this _properly_ is important to _him._ Hux is being considerate. ‘Fuck I love you,’ he blurts out.

Hux glances at him with amused confusion. ‘You’ve said.’

‘And I will keep saying it,’ he laughs, drunk on the moment. ‘I will say it every day until the end of time. I love you!’

Hux doesn’t say it back, but he can feel something that really does feel like love in the tangle of the redhead’s emotions and that’s good enough. The trip back to his rooms contradictorily seems to take forever and be over in moments, and then they’re there, and he realises he has no gifts for the redhead.

While gifts aren’t a necessary part of courtship alphas often give them anyway. Sometimes to help convince an omega who isn’t completely won over, sometimes because the omega demands them, sometimes just out of appreciation— but he has nothing to give Hux other than— ‘I promise you that we will destroy the Resistance and conquer, _rule,_ the Galaxy. Side by Side.’

Hux glances at him, then seems to realise how serious he’s being. The sentiment registers, and Hux flushes a deeper shade of pink, pleasure and desire rushing through him. ‘We will, won’t we?’ the omega says with a light, happy laugh. ‘You and me, we are going to grind our enemies beneath the heel of the First Order.’

He kisses that plump, perfect mouth, tasting the words, the promise of violence yet to come, then opens his door and ushers Hux inside. Heart in his throat he leads the omega over to his nest—

‘Oh,’ Hux sighs. ‘I didn’t know you’d actually made one. It’s lovely. Perfect.’

He feels the words thrill through him, feels his dick swell the rest of the way to full hardness. ‘You like it?’ he can’t help asking, hating how needy he sounds. 

The redhead turns to him, cups his face in those lovely hands, leans in and plants a biting kiss on his lips. ‘I do. I really, really do. I want you to fuck me in it.’

‘Oh fuck,’ he breaths against the redhead’s red mouth. ‘Fuck. Get your clothes off.’

‘You too,’ Hux insists, ‘none of this fucking me fully dressed this time.’

‘Ok, ok,’ he mumbles, fingers tangling in the cloth of his training gear as he watches Hux shed the greatcoat, leaving it carefully folded over the back of the couch, then proceed to shed all his layers, one by one, every item carefully folded and placed with the greatcoat, from boots and jacket and trousers, down to shirt, to vest and underwear and socks, and then to perfect, sublime nudity. He realises he’s stopped, is staring, helpless, as the redhead delicately steps over the side of the nest and glances at him. ‘Do you need help?’

He shakes his head, strips himself down roughly, then ‘Oh shit. I need a shower. I’m covered in sweat.’

‘I don’t mind,’ the redhead says with a shrug and an increase of that blush. He can read that Hux doesn’t, likes him a stinky, sweaty, _fierce_ alpha— even if he can barely smell him right now— and so strong, and so big, and his dick and his knot— huge, and he shudders as Hux feels that first trail of slick drip out and run down his thigh.

‘Fuck I’ll be just—’ he blurts. ‘I just don’t want the scent of other alphas in our nest.’ He’s got blood on him, and not just his.

‘Alright, but be quick’ Hux says, delicately taking a seat on the padding of the nest, probably dampening the fabric beneath— and he wavers, wavers, but no. No, He’s not transferring the stink of another alpha to his mate. 

He rips his training gear getting it off and then lurches to his bathroom, flinging himself under the water and glad that the heat comes on instantly. He lathers himself up, using the same product on body and hair, and only just manages to convince himself to slap on some conditioner and rinse it straight out when he thinks Hux might want to run his hands through his hair. His dick is agony. He’s worried he’ll knot up before he even gets inside the redhead. 

When he’s clean enough he turns off the shower and lurches out of the bathroom, grabbing a towel on his way past that he uses to rub distractedly at any patch of damp that catches his attention, before quickly rubbing it through his hair and throwing it aside. Hux is lying down in the nest, not touching himself, but luxuriating in it the way that other redheaded omega had done in that other porn.

He hesitates for a moment, standing outside the nest, worried that the omega will suddenly reject him when it comes down to it, but then Hux is holding out his arms to him and he’s all too happy to collapse into the omega’s embrace. They kiss, clumsy still, but getting better, and his hands wander over Hux’s body, squeezing at that soft, spare, silky flesh. ‘I want to fuck you,’ he whines just as Hux moans ‘get your knot in me.’

They laugh and kiss and then the redhead pushes him back to ask, ‘How do you want to do this? Traditionally, with me on my hands and knees?’

He imagines it, imagines sinking his teeth into the nape of the redhead’s neck— but his imagination also barrages him with a litany of other wants and he wants it all— but he has to decide, so he says ‘The traditional way, just this first time.’

The idea pleases Hux, being mounted, mated properly, but still the redhead asks ‘This first time? How do you want it the next time?’

He groans, burying his face against the smooth skin of the omega’s throat, kissing it, sucking bites onto it. ‘I want you to make me _beg_ for it—’

He feels Hux shudder in his arms, the thought thrilling through him. Oh yes, Hux wants that too. He wants that so badly. ‘Oh fuck. You were made for me, weren’t you?’ the redhead mewls. 

‘For no one else,’ he promises. ‘Never for anyone else.’

Then Hux is guiding his hand up between the redhead’s legs and his fingers are slipping against that slick, wet, soft and wanting hole. ‘Get me open for you,’ the redhead sighs against his throat. He probes at it, feels the slick slip over his own skin, and he wants to pull back and shove his sticky fingers into his mouth, but no— Hux wants him to— he pushes, feeling the redhead’s body swallow him up. Perfect. 

He’s not entirely sure what he’s doing, but Hux seems to be enjoying himself, so he’ll just keep doing it until the redhead tells him to do something else. He mouths at the omega’s throat, kissing, sucking, licking, and he wishes he could smell Hux more than the faint ghosts of scent not yet captured and absorbed by the pheromone scrubbers. He wants to roll about in Hux’s scent, the water-blossom musk of his slick. He wants to paint his face, his body in it, until everyone knows he belongs to Hux. 

Another finger, feeling Hux’s ass pulse around them, and why did he ever try to fight this? 

Hux is surging against him, canting those slim hips to take his fingers deeper, little moans puffing out, pale eyes rolled back in his head. Suddenly the redhead grabs his wrist, stops the motion of his hand, and he’s about to yelp a question about what he’s done wrong but the omega has his eyes open and is looking at him and is saying, ‘I can’t stand it anymore. Get your dick in me.’

The moment his fingers are out the redhead is struggling over onto his belly, and he finds himself shifting with Hux, pushing up in close so he can nose at , nuzzle at, the fine red hair at the base of the omega’s skull, then he’s got a hand on his dick and he’s guiding it true, and as the head slips over the slick softness of Hux’s hole he lets his teeth sink in to the nape of that long neck and thrusts forward, feeling Hux’s passage spasm as he lodges partway in.

Another thrust, mindless, animal, and he’s in a bit more, teeth still clenched in the mounting bite— not hard enough to split skin, draw blood, but enough to leave a bruise and enough that they both shudder with the implications of it— Hux’s hips bounce underneath him, the redhead trying to force his dick in further, but for one thrust, two, they’re out of sync until suddenly it works. He pushes forward, Hux pushes back, he sinks in to the root. 

‘Oh fuck,’ Hux whines, falling forward, until the redhead’s ass is up but his head is pillowed on his arms on the padding of the nest. He follows, the bite still locked, his hips thrusting, grinding his cock into the omega’s dripping depths. He can feel the way the redhead’s thighs are shaking with every thrust, the omega already riding the edge of his first orgasm, mind a blear of want, consciousness narrowed down to his pelvis— The burning glow of his own little omega dick, the hungry maw of his ass getting filled. 

He gropes at the redhead’s thighs, his waist, gets a hand down there, that little omega dick fitting perfectly in his grip as he squeezes at it, feeling Hux’s hole spasm as he does. His other hand gets caught in the redhead’s grip, fingers lacing as the omega shudders and drools and spasms in his arms, orgasm catching him and dragging him down. 

He feels Hux’s ass spasm, pulse around him, feels it as if the redhead is trying to suck him deeper into that divine body— then he’s lost. He feels the burning ache start in his knot, one thrust, two, then it starts catching, then it’s little thrusts, then it’s grinding, and then he feels the burning pull of it catch, feels Hux’s hole lock down in reflex, feels the redhead come apart in his arms, catapulted straight into another orgasm, one of the long and endless and stupefying ones that having a knot inside induces. 

He loses himself, teeth letting go, panting helpless and stupid against the back of Hux’s neck as pulse after pulse of cum squirts up into the redhead’s insides. In his arms Hux shudders, mewls, mind a morass of pleasure— feeding back into his own pleasure. And he loses himself.

It’s his knot starting to soften that brings him back to himself. He feels Hux’s hole relax, then feels it spasm, trying to push him out and out he goes, his dick slopping wet and sticky against the redhead’s upper thighs. He feels his own cum come sliding after, oozing out of the red and wet mess he’s made of his mate. He pulls back carefully. ‘Are you alright?’ He hopes he didn’t hurt Hux.

The redhead groans and stretches beneath him, extending arms and legs and then catching at him before he can pull away properly. ‘That was lovely. I can’t wait for you to put it in me again.’ 

He gazes down at his omega, the bruise on the back of his neck, the slippery smear of slick and cum everywhere, the swollen pulse of his abused hole. ‘Did I hurt you?’

‘Hm,’ Hux murmurs, pushing at him and rolling over, until they’re lying face to face, his arms around the redhead’s narrow body. ‘No,’ a twitch of one red brow. ‘Well, perhaps we should wait at least half an hour before we do it again, but you didn’t hurt me Ben. I might be a little sore, but I like the way it feels.’

‘How about I kiss it better?’ he offers, the idea lighting up across his mind, making his exhausted dick twitch— but outside of rut he might actually have to wait for it to be able to get hard again.

‘You want to get your mouth back on it, huh?’ Hux smirks, lying back, and then when he gets to his knees, spreading those long legs and pulling them up until he can get a really good look at what he’s wrought.

Red, wet, swollen, drooling slick, drooling his cum, still gaping, still spasming— he dives in tongue first, lapping over the tender flesh, then spearing his tongue and chasing the taste of his cum, trying to lick it all out of Hux and swallow it down. He works away there, alternately tonguing and sucking at the redhead’s ass, until the idea strikes to stick a couple of fingers in, and then he laps around them and pulls them out every now and then to suck them clean, but then Hux is playing with his pretty little dick by his head, hard and swollen that perfect pink, and he wants his mouth there instead, so he leaves the fingers inside and sucks the redhead’s cock down, encouraging his omega to fuck his mouth, cockhead just teasing his throat, long fingers tangled roughly in his hair, pale thighs bracketing his head, and swallowing every drop when Hux finally jerks up beneath him and comes. 

After that he braces himself over Hux’s long, pale form and jerks his dick roughly, the redhead’s hand coming up to help so he can transfer his own grip to his knot and squirt long streams of cum all over his omega’s perfect thighs. Hux lifts his cum smeared hand to his lips and sucks his fingers clean, and when he leans down for a kiss the redhead chases their combined taste around his mouth with his tongue and they kiss, and they kiss, and they kiss as he flops down onto his mate and lets himself be cradled in the embrace of Hux’s body. 

‘I love you,’ he murmurs into the redhead’s mouth again and again. ‘I love you, I love you, I love you.’

Slowly, still kissing, they sink to sleep and rest for a while, waking later, sometime in the afternoon, and he orders them both food and watches as Hux eats, still naked, still oozing fluids from his ass onto the padding of their nest. 

They rest again for a bit after that, his chest to Hux’s back, his dick nestled up against Hux’s ass— but it’s the latter that ends up disturbing their sleep. He gets hard, Hux starts grinding back against him, and they’re petting at each other, kissing, licking, mouthing at any part of the other’s body they can reach and he ends up on his back, Hux kneeling over him, the redhead’s hole just there, teasing the head of his dick, and the redhead is holding his arms down beside his head even though he could so easily break the grip, and every time he thrusts his hips up Hux pulls back, before bringing his hips back down as he lets his own sink back against the padding of the nest, the redhead moving so the slippery heat of him is only just kissing his cockhead, and it’s wonderful, it’s perfect, it’s horribly frustrating but he loves it, and it continues on and on until he is begging, pleading to be allowed up inside, and until Hux is panting, hot strings of slick mixed with his old cum drooling down out of the omega’s body in fiery lines to drip over his throbbing dick, and he can feel how hard both their hearts are beating, and eventually Hux tells him he’s been a _good, patient alpha,_ and starts to drop those hips down until the head of him just slips inside— then he can’t hold himself back anymore, he surges up, into his omega’s waiting arms, and carries them both over until Hux is on his back and he’s between the redhead’s legs and his dick is lodged up inside, and it’s one thrust, two, and then his knot is swelling and they’re locking and the both of them slip into the throws of it. 

Later they lie clean and cuddled up in his berth, the nest something of a write-off at this point. Smeared and stained beyond useability. The next one he builds will be even better— perhaps he can order some parts for it, not pre-fab frames, that feels like cheating, but maybe even some cane to weave the walls. 

They fucked again in the shower, Hux pinned by his bulk against the slick walls, but he got a hand on his knot and kept it outside the redhead, since shower sex and knotting aren’t exactly a great combination. He has his nose buried in the hair at the base of the redhead’s skull, pulling in huffs of the deadened scent of mated omega. Hux smells like _his_ now. No matter where the redhead goes in the world as long as people can smell him they’ll know he’s taken—

‘I hate the pheromone scrubbers,’ he sighs. ‘I wish I could smell you properly.’

‘Mm,’ Hux mumbles, rubbing his face against his arm. ‘At least all the omegas of the fleet know you’re taken— I find myself feeling more possessive than I had expected.’

‘Feel as possessive as you like,’ he murmurs, kissing the bruise he left on the nape of Hux’s neck. He feels the redhead shudder in his arms. ‘I’m _yours_ after all.’

‘You’re making me want to do something very foolish,’ Hux sighs, grinding his hips back and then hissing, ‘But I’m too sore right now.’

‘I’m sorry,’ he whispers against the redhead’s neck, pressing another kiss there.

‘Don’t be,’ Hux insists. ‘I loved every moment of it and can’t wait to do it again.’

‘How about I kiss it better?’ he offers.

There is a moment, the tiniest hint of hesitation, before Hux shores himself up, speaks, voice a dark tease. ‘How about I get you on your knees and make you _beg_ to be allowed to?’ 

He feels his hips lurch forward, dick _throbbing,_ ‘Oh yes. Yes please.’

Hux grinds his hips back for a moment, before hissing again. ‘In a little while though. I feel a bit tired, and I am enjoying this as well.’

‘Me too,’ he replies, burying his face against the redhead’s nape. ‘You feel perfect in my arms.’ They snuggle for a moment, and he luxuriates in the feel of Hux— but the weak scent keeps bothering him. ‘If we turned the scrubbers off would everyone go back into season?’

‘Hm,’ the redhead pushes at him until he has room to turn around and lie facing him, a contemplative look on his face. ‘I don’t think so. It only happened because you killed Snoke— because the pack was unhealthy to start with— and, if we are honest, because you didn’t have enough of a connection with the pack to ensure a stable transition. But the pack is stable now and they’ve accepted you as Supreme Leader and Dominant Alpha— so no. I don’t think it will. Are you thinking of doing it?’

‘I want to be able to smell you,’ he whines, but then, serious, ‘Since what happened to the fleet is so rare I find that I don’t actually understand why pheromone scrubbers are standard equipment in the first place— and not just here, but everywhere, on every ship, in every public building, on every world I’ve ever visited— and scent suppressants. Doesn’t it all just make a Galaxy in which omegas are more vulnerable?’

Hux stares at him for a moment, shocked, and then pleased. ‘Of course. That’s the point— no matter what society will tell you about it making things safer for omegas, that omegas are less likely to be attacked if alphas can’t smell their heat, every study has proved it to be the reverse. Without our pheromones and the reaction alphas have to them we are a lot more vulnerable, and that’s why walking around exuding scent is all but taboo— alphas— not alphas like you, but alphas like my father’s friends, _hate_ their own weakness to omega pheromones and want a life free of it.’

For a moment his mind flickers back to Luke, his scent suppressant allergy, and he wonders what effect that had on his uncle— but that’s a thought for another day. ‘So, would there be any negative result from turning off the pheromone scrubbers?’

Hux thinks for a moment and then shakes his head. ‘No. As far as I know there wouldn’t be, as long as what happened doesn’t happen again, and it might even help pack cohesiveness. A huge amount of unacknowledged information is spread through scent— though that may be less of an issue for you as long as everyone’s mind remains open to you.’

‘Do you mind it, that I can read you like that?’

Another moment’s thought. ‘Not as long as you never use it to control me; you do and then I am going to shoot you.’

‘I do and I will kneel down in front of you and hand you the blaster,’ he promises, and then laughs. ‘We could have just waited the bloody thing out, we didn’t even need to install them in the end.’

Hux shrugs. ‘Maybe we’ll need them in the future.’

‘Not if I can help it,’ he swears, then leans in and kisses his mate.


End file.
